Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Jesse's driving so fast in Todd's fucking beat-up El Camino that, when his heart stutters and he hits the breaks about ten seconds after smashing through the compound's front gate, he fishtails and ends up screeching off the shoulder into some scrub brush. His pulse is sky high, threatening to burst the top of his skull and rip right through the roof of the car like it's tinfoil.

He can't breathe. He needs air, needs it so desperately he can't see straight, so he fumbles the driver's side door open and spends the next ten seconds swiveled sideways in the seat with his aching feet and ankles braced against the sage-flecked ground. Head between his knees, sobbing for breath, eyes down. He's gripping his shins so tightly he wants to scream.

"That solves nothing, huh," Jesse mumbles at one of those huge, dopey desert millipedes as it ambles by the toes of his sneakers. "Yeah, man," he hiccups, letting one shaky hand drop down to brush across the smooth, meandering line of its back. Goddamn things never have the sense to run.

Unlike me, he thinks, his laughter as startling as it had been within the confines of the car. Yeah, he'd run like nobody's business, and look where that had gotten him. He should've remembered the security cameras. Douchebags like Gus and Jack are too smart not to have them.

Jesse launches himself forward, staggering to his feet, missing the unperturbed millipede by inches. He's got his hands in his hair now, desperate for something, anything to cover his head, but his scalp itches. Those motherfuckers had given him some different clothes to wear, sure, and had even started to let him shower once or twice a week under armed guard in the clubhouse around the time he'd successfully convinced Todd that being filthy would compromise the quality of his cook.

He watches the millipede vanish back into the undergrowth, his lungs constricting again, all progress obliterated. He should be getting in touch with Saul's vacuum repair guy, getting the fuck out of dodge, but how the hell's he going to pay for that? Oh, yeah: the sixty or seventy-odd million he's left in dozens of backpacks, duffel bags, suitcases, and oil drums out in one of the storage sheds. Jack had been talking complete shit; if Mr. White was even a little longer for this world, then he wasn't going to have any trouble finding it.

What if he's not dying from the gunshot? What if the bullet went straight through and he's just, like, bleeding a lot and shit? Did you actually think you could just leave him behind?

Jesse swears and kicks at the nearest tumbleweed, almost throwing himself off balance. He dives back into the car, scrabbling at the baffling array of crap he finds piled in the passenger seat. McDonald's and Chick-fil-A wrappers, even some napkins and sauce packets left from when Pollos Hermanos was still a thing. His bitten-to-the-quick fingernails skid across something smooth like the millipede's shell, only broader and the opposite of wiggly. He closes his fist around it, blinking.

"Jackpot!" he shouts, throat raw, instantly recognizing the spare phone as one of the disposable ones they'd all been in the habit of carrying during the glory days of Vamonos Pest. He flips it open, frantic, jamming his thumb against the power button, scarcely breathing as the screen's glow flares to life. He feels dizzy again, still needs air, but now all he can think is that he's never been so glad he memorized a few important numbers and shit post-clusterfuck in Mexico. Applied himself. Turns out there's no motivation like almost dying in increasingly terrible ways.

Jesse doesn't think too hard about the one he dials first. It's a gamble, and it could get him killed.

(Or save someone's life, someone he doesn't owe squat. But he's not the bad guy anymore.)

"Hey, Dr. Goodman? It's Jesse Pinkman. You still got those bags of blood? And, like, maybe some chemo drugs I saw you had stockpiled for Mr. White? Adriamycin and Cytoxan? Anyway, I saw some of the Red Devil at least in your fridge; they gave my aunt that shit. Listen, I know Gus is dead and everything, but I'm sitting on a whole lotta green, and I'm willing to let you name your price for a ride in your magical undercover ambulance as long as you don't ask too many questions. Crossroads Motel, Room 211. Like, as soon as you can. With my luck, you'll get there after the bastard stops breathing, and, believe me, I don't wanna give him the pleasure."

Please be this side of the border, Jesse thought. You gotta check your voicemail. Please.

He's shaking by the time he hangs up. He can't jump back behind the wheel, not quite yet. He's thinking more clearly than he's ever thought in his life, like, shit, even after everything Walter fucking White's done to him, he's still on autopilot with figuring out some way to get them the hell out of this. But, no, it's also about Mr. White not getting his way. Dude wants to die, so Jesse's not going to let him. He sneers, huffs out a lungful of nighttime frost, yearns for a cigarette as he dials the next number. She better not have changed it.

"I don't recognize your fuckin' digits," Wendy rasps, tinny on the line. "Who the hell is this?"

"You know who this is," Jesse says, struggling to keep his voice under control. "Hey, like, sorry to scare you and shit, but I got like ten grand here with your fuckin' name on it if you just do what the fuck I tell you, okay?" He sucks in a breath, still dizzy. "Yo, are you payin' attention to me?"

"Twenty grand," counters Wendy, and he hears her drag shakily on a cigarette or something.

"Fine, twenty grand. Fuck, I'll give you thirty if you promise not to ask me shit, because I'm gonna hang up as soon as I say this next part," Jesse tells her, steeling his nerves as he slides back behind the wheel, pulling the driver's side door shut behind him. "Make sure the bedclothes are clean, I mean, like, pristine, do you know what that means? Squeaky fucking clean. Get that shit from reception if you can do it without making anybody suspicious, and change the bed yourself. Wendy, are you still with me?"

"Yeah," she answers petulantly, and she doesn't sound high, so that's progress. "What else?"

"Then, I want you to walk over to Walgreens at Central and Girard. Get a shower curtain to put down over the sheets, plus some boxers and socks and stuff—enough for a couple of guys for, like, a few days or a week. Me and somebody about twice my size, don't gotta tell you who. Jeans and shirts. Gonna need those, too. He's a 34 waist or something? Maybe 32 by now. Whatever's cheap."

"Gotta go shopping for you and your boyfriend, got it," Wendy drawls, taking another insolent, leisurely drag on her cigarette, and, Jesus, does Jesse want a smoke. "Are you gonna hang up or what?"

Before he can spit obscenities back, he kills the call. He turns the key in the ignition, instinctively relieved when the engine revs without protest. He dials the third and final number, shivering.

Skinny Pete doesn't pick up for five or six rings. "Hey, man! Dunno who the shit this is, but—"

"You know who the shit this is!" Jesse snaps, tired of repeating himself. "And the last thing I need is you tweaking out on me right now, so shut your huge yap and listen up."

"Jesse," Pete breathes. "Holy shit. It's you. Okay. Yeah, man. Listening."

"I'm gonna text you some, like, super specific directions in a couple of minutes," Jesse explains, fingers of his free hand fidgeting on the wheel, flicking imaginary ash. "To refresh your memory."

Pete lets loose with some nervous laughter, but he sounds sober. "Dude, you're not gonna believe what's happened to me and Badge in like the last twenty-four hours, it's the absolute craziest shit, like—"

"Don't wanna know, but I can probably take a guess," Jesse gritted out, cutting him off. "This is absolutely what it fucking sounds like. When you get to the place I want you to go, you're gonna case the shed farthest back against the left-hand perimeter. There's tons of luggage and shit. If it looks like a bag or a suitcase or somethin' you'd travel with, grab it. You gotta grab as much as you can, okay?" he repeated, reining in his desperation. "Use two cars if you can get your hands on 'em.  That way you can split up if anybody tails you. Grab the stuff and get to Wendy's."

Briefly, Jesse hears a muffled exchange that can only mean Pete's covered the mouthpiece and is having some kind of dipshit conference with Badger. "We've got your back, dude," Pete confirms a few seconds later. "Totally on it. As long as there's, uh, you know, there's somethin' in it for—"

"You'll be so goddamn rich you won't know whether to snort it or fuck it," Jesse says, hanging up.

This is the part, Jesse thinks, dismantling the phone once he's sent the text, where everything goes either, like, completely to shit, or it works out because Mr. White is the Devil and has the luck of same. He turns the car around and drives like the whole DEA unit's on his tail.

The first thing Jesse thinks, once he's parked back inside the compound and out of the car on wobbly legs and shaking like a goddamn leaf, is that he forgot to scrounge in the car for a gun. There's no time, he tells himself, frantically scanning the dirt driveway. Mr. White is nowhere in sight, which, like, doesn't surprise him at all. If I were you, douchebag, I'd probably be—

Yeah, he knows exactly where he'd be right now if he was Mr. White in full on Butthurt Heisenberg Mode. It's between the cash and the glass, and he's running to the latter against every screaming-protest atom of his being. He doesn't want to go back, he does not, but his heart stutters in his chest, pulled like a fucking lodestone. He twists the doorknob, pushes inside.

Mr. White's lying on the floor, gas mask abandoned to his left, arms spread like he's halted while making a snow angel. It's ridiculous. His breathing's shaky, but it's regular, and his eyes are open. He doesn't seem to notice Jesse has stepped so close that Jesse's sneakers touch his hair.

Jesse peers down at him in confused horror as he notices just how much the blood stain has spread.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" he demands, dropping to a crouch next to Mr. White's head. "You better look at me, asshole, while this change of heart shit's still happening." He crawls forward, re-situating himself along Mr. White's uninjured side so that he's looking at him right side up. He smacks Mr. White's cheek with one hand, shaking his shoulder with the other.

"You came back," breathes Mr. White, clutching Jesse's hands. "Why—why would you—"

"Ain't got no time for this, Walt," Jesse tells him, spitting the name like an insult. "Get up."

"That's only the—" Mr. White wheezes as Jesse helps him slowly into a sitting position, and then forward onto his hands and knees "—third or..." His words devolve into that dry, terrible rattle that, much to Jesse's fury, still makes Jesse's chest clench in concern. "Fourth time. You've ever."

"Shut up, asshole. I'm gonna make a regular habit of callin' you worse," Jesse hisses, getting Mr. White's left arm around his neck, bracing his free hand flat against the gritty floor. "There, that better? Wait, what am I saying. Don't care. On one, two—"

"Coming from you," Mr. White winces, groaning through his teeth as Jesse hauls him to his feet, "I'd say—that's almost—affectionate." He sways where they stand, sagging into Jesse's side. "I thought I'd never stand up again."

"If you don't shut your fucking mouth, I'm gonna drop you," Jesse warns. "The car's this way."

"Duly noted," Mr. White says, pale and tight lipped. He lets Jesse hobble them along at slightly more than a snail's pace until they'd reach Todd's car where Jesse has left it, both front doors hanging wide open, in the middle of the driveway. "Jesse, are you—sure you have a—"

"Plan's already in motion, Mr. White, and I swear to God—" Jesse shoves the guy down hard in the passenger seat, ignoring the resulting cry of anguish even though it makes him feel sick. "You've just gotta trust I've got this under control, okay?"

Mr. White draws his legs inside the car, gesturing weakly at the door. He's already bleeding on the seat, and if that isn't panic inducing on top of everything else that already has Jesse's nerves jangling worse than the memory of withdrawal, then Jesse doesn't know what is.

Jesse closes the door more carefully than he should, stalking around to the driver's seat. He slams his own door shut, fumbling with his seatbelt. He can't afford to worry about Mr. White's, and, anyway, it'd do him more harm than good. "Stay quiet and let me drive," he mutters.

Mr. White nods, so Jesse wrenches the ignition and hits the pedal, gunning them out of there. 

 * * *

Twenty-seven minutes later, Wendy isn't happy to see them. In fact, she is fucking pissed off as shit, a fact of which Jesse is aware without benefit of, like, Mr. White's PhD. Jesse had jury-rigged Mr. White's jacket around him as a makeshift bandage at the last stop-light and had also wrapped him in an Indian blanket he'd found wadded up in the back seat, and it's a miracle nobody'd hassled them for stumbling up the concrete stairs to Wendy's room like that. Crossroads regulars and residents tend to be nosy as fuck.

Now, Mr. White, dumped seconds ago on Wendy's turned-down, shower-curtain-covered bed, seems to have passed out. Not a single fucking word had passed between them on the drive, and if Jesse had believed in some higher power he surely would've thanked it for going to the trouble of shutting this asshole's mouth. Jesse sets a hand on Mr. White's chest, feeling the rise and fall of it, brows knit, while Wendy stands there barefoot and weary with her arms crossed and her mascara smudged.

"Did you think any further ahead than this?" she asks sarcastically, reaching for her pack of cigarettes on the bedside table, and, yeah, Jesse so deserves it. "I bet not, 'cause everyone knows you're a regular Einstein. What about the cops?"

"The Feds ain't gonna look here, all right?" Jesse says, letting his eyes meet hers, refusing to let on that he's scared. "This is, like, under their noses and everything. Hiding in plain sight." This whole thing feels wrong when Presbyterian Hospital's literally right across the street.

"Who else you got comin' to this party?" Wendy asks, sticking a Parliament between her lips before tossing the pack to Jesse while she lights up. The smell makes Jesse sick as much as it tempts him.

"This doctor guy, that's all you need to know, plus Skinny and Badger," Jesse replies, swallowing hard, setting the cigarettes back on the nightstand, but not before shoving one behind his ear.

"Your hair's seen better days," Wendy remarks, smirking. "Since when's Heisenberg got hair?"

"Uh, since it grew back? Isn't that how it works?" Jesse retorts, pulling his hand back mid-reach when he realizes that it's made, of its own damn accord, as if to touch Mr. White's face.

"Jesse," Mr. White murmurs, starling them both, but his eyes don't open. "I think...where..."

"Thinkin' ain't your job anymore, Mr. White," Jesse tells him, giving his cheek a sharp, quick slap. He nods to Wendy, indicating with a nod that she should pull over one of the chairs from the table next to the shuttered window. "Thanks for gettin' the clothes. I'm gonna shower real quick."

"Oh, and what do I do if this doctor guy gets here while you're in there?" Wendy demands, flicking ash on the carpet. "How do I know if who's knockin' is the right person, huh? What's he look like?"

"Use the peep-hole! Beefy Hispanic dude," Jesse tells her, already halfway to the bathroom door, snagging both Wal-Mart bags on his way. Christ, his lungs are constricting again; maybe the steam will help. "Kinda your type. More than I ever was, anyhow—like, whatever, I was glad to pay."

"Your skinny ass is his type," Wendy says, her voice muffled as Jesse closes the bathroom door, and he doesn't have to ask which he she's talking about. Yeah, he's spent the better part of a year not fucking thinking about that to the point that it's sometimes all he thinks about.

Jesse doesn't look at himself in the mirror while he undresses. He sets the cigarette on the sink.

There's not enough shitty motel soap or travel-size shampoo on earth to make Jesse feel clean again, but the steam does open up his throat and his nasal passages to an epic onslaught of snot as he braces himself against the chipped barf-green tile and sobs his fucking heart out.

Once he's dry and dressed again, cigarette back behind his ear, in a thin plaid button-down and scratchy blue boxers and jeans that slide off his hips, he emerges to find Dr. Barry Goodman sitting in Wendy's chair next to the bed and Wendy smoking next to the window with her back turned.

"You've got nerve, Mr. Pinkman," says Dr. Goodman, who's checking Mr. White's pulse. "I spotted security cameras outside, but your friend reassures me that none of them actually work?"

"Yeah, and I've got money on the way," Jesse says, struggling into a pair of firework-patterned socks that were apparently ninety-nine cents in the post-Fourth-of-July sale bin. "So quit bitching."

"The wound's shockingly clean," Dr. Goodman informs him, "and I don't think the bullet's still lodged inside, but I won't know until I can take a closer look. I can't do that here, as I'll risk setting off more bleeding. Two of my team are waiting outside." He wiped his brow on the sleeve of his striped dress-shirt, tapping Mr. White's cheek, which elicited a faint sigh from his patient. "So, once your—what should we call it, magic undercover cash shipment?—arrives, where do you propose we take him for treatment? We can't stay put here, Mr. Pinkman. The long-term risk's too high."

Jesse rubs his jaw, hating the scruff he finds there, like it's somehow a surprise or whatever. This is where he's fucked up, fucked up big-time, because how could he be so fucking stupid as to assume that Dr. Goodman would be able to spirit his shit up to the hotel room and then work on Mr. White like it's nothing? They probably can't stay put; Wendy would have a fit. Jesse's starting to pace back and forth, frantic, when there's a volley of knocks on the door that makes Wendy yelp Jesus! and race over to answer.

"Dude, this is so, so, so not cool!" Badger yells, smacking right into Wendy as she lets him and Skinny Pete inside. He's got a grubby backpack in hand, and Pete's also nervously shouldering one. He lowers his voice, still freaking out, getting right up in Jesse's face. "There's all these dead bodies and shit out there, man! Why didn't you give us some fuckin' warning?"

"Because reasons!" Jesse hisses back, shoving Badger in Pete's direction, but not before yanking the backpack out of his grasp and gesturing for Pete to surrender his loot, too. He takes a second to unzip and peer into both, satisfied that they're crammed to the gills with cash.

Wendy's peering over his shoulder, goggle-eyed. "Screw thirty," she says. "I want a hundred."

"A hundred Gs, are you fucking insane?" Jesse laughs, waving a single stack in her face. "You'd shoot it up in, like, a week." He grabs four more and shoves all five at her, finding he's still entirely desensitized to this much cash. "Fifty."

"Asshole," she snaps at him, running over to dump the armful of money onto the rucked-up bedspread next to Walt's feet before zigzagging back to the chest of drawers. "I'm fuckin' outta here, what d'you think of that? Asshole. I got a kid to think of!"

"Yeah, yeah," Jesse sighs, rubbing the side of his neck, "or blow it on root beer for all I care." He turns from Wendy and her frantic packing, acutely aware that Badger and Skinny Pete are still staring at him, getting more and more fidgety by the second. He re-zips the backpacks and tosses one back at each of them, nodding his approval. "How many more bags do you have outside?"

"Like ten in each car, maybe twelve," says Badger, swallowing hard. "Didn't have time to count, man. There's still, like, a ton in the compound. We would've needed a third set of wheels, I swear!"

Dr. Goodman clears his throat, on his feet, fingers latching onto Mr. White's wrist in alarm. "If someone doesn't help me get this man outside now, I can't promise that his prospects will remain as hopeful as they are. If they are."

"Just chill, I'll do it," Jesse says, gathering up the Walgreens bags where he'd abandoned them between the bed and the bathroom, slinging them high enough up his arm that he's carrying them like a couple of purses or something. As an afterthought, he grabs the nearest empty shopping bag he can find and shoves the bloody clothes and blanket Dr. Goodman had peeled off of Mr. White into it. "People are gonna see us carry him out. I kinda just hope they'll think he's drunk off his ass or high or beat-up or whatever. It happens often enough around here, lemme tell you."

Wendy just shrugs, shoving the last of her clothes into her ratty shoulder bag, shoving her feet into one of like a dozen pairs of stiletto heels scattered around the room. "I ain't seen nothin'," she says, pushing past all of them, making a hasty exit. "I hope you fuckers have a real nice life."

"Hey, not so fast," Jesse says, thinking of something. He fishes in his back pocket for Todd's car keys, and then tosses them at Wendy. She catches them, alert. "Keys to the sweet-ass '78 El Camino you're gonna find parked out there. I know you still ain't got a car. Clean up the blood and shit, use it for whatever you need to, and then, like, take it to that guy who used to keep the Ship for me. You might have to give him some cash, but, who knows, he might buy it off you for parts."

Wendy flips him off with the same hand in which she's got the keys, but she nods as she flees.

Skinny Pete and Badger leave next, with the shower curtain folded up under Pete's coat and the understanding that they're to follow Dr. Goodman's armored truck wherever it goes. Juggling Mr. White out the door and down the stairs between himself and Dr. Goodman is the tough part; Mr. White jerks and moans and shivers because Dr. Goodman's trying to keep hold of him under the arms and keep his fresh Walgreens shirt down while, shit, Jesse notices that the bleeding's started up again. Jesse's got Mr. White's feet as they stagger down the concrete stairs, almost tripping over himself, his chafed-raw wrists aching.

He doesn't know how the team in the truck knows to push the doors open as they approach, but they do. Once Mr. White's bundled inside for the strapping-down ambulance bustle to start, Dr. Goodman eyes Skinny Pete's backpack. Jesse nods to Pete, who unshoulders and unzips it.

"Give me all of that bag for starters," says Dr. Goodman, unblinking, "and I'll go inside and get to work. And you, Mr. Pinkman, will get in the front seat and make whatever calls you need to make."

"Yeah, that's right," Jesse says, grabbing the backpack off an indignant Pete and shoving it at Dr. Goodman. "And I'll just, uh, tell your driver exactly where to go once...I know..." Jesse makes a useless gesture. "Relax, I've got a guy."

"I'll just take another one," Pete says, tapping Badger on the shoulder. "Gotta drive now, yo!"

On the road again, in the passenger seat, buckled in next to Dr. Goodman's driver with two Walgreens bags crinkling between his fucked-up ankles and another goddamn disposable cell phone in his shaking right hand, Jesse dials the only other number he's got memorized and prays.

He's running on adrenaline and no sleep and he's improbably, miraculously cold-turkey clean as the phone rings and rings and rings until, heart in his throat, he hears somebody pick up. This is Mr. White's luck on his side all right.

"Best Quality Vacuum Repair," says a put-upon, gravelly voice. "We're technically closed now."

"Yeah, well," says Jesse, swallowing hard, "I technically need a dust filter for a Hoover Max Extract 60 Pressure Pro, only, like..." He flounders, trawling his brain for every scrap of code-word bullshit and detail about the nature of this guy's operation that he can remember Saul patiently spelling out for him, realizing he's going to have to improvise past a certain point. "Not just the Deluxe Service.  We are talking...super, super Deluxe Service with a cherry on top, like...where I come to you right the fuck now and we grab the stuff, like, that's how urgently I need it. This place is filthy, man, and my vacuum's way busted. Like, it's gushing shit everywhere. My friend can repair it on-site if you have the parts."

There's a heavy, sullen sigh on the end of the line, followed by a single question: "It's him?"

"Sorry to burst your bubble, but yeah," Jesse mutters, glancing at the driver. "So, like...direct me."

 * * *

The Disappearer is one of the sorriest-ass motherfuckers Jesse's ever seen. He's got dark circles under his eyes, and his greying dark hair sticks out in every direction. He opens the gate and stands aside, letting all three vehicles pass. Once they've all parked, Jesse jogs over to where Skinny Pete's a step ahead of him, removing yet another random backpack from the back seat of his car, passing it off to Jesse. He spins on his heel and approaches the guy with the backpack while Dr. Goodman and his team wheel Mr. White—cut out of his fresh clothes already and strapped to a gurney with IV and oxygen mask and everything already, holy shit—off the truck. Jesse swallows hard.

"There's like six hundred and fifty, maybe seven hundred in here," he says, handing the backpack to their would-be savior. "How's that for a downpayment? Does it sound like overtime's worth your while?"

Dude glances over his shoulder at the medical hubbub, eyeing Mr. White's inert form with pitying distaste. "Walt always made it worth my while, I'll give him that. Looks like you follow suit."

"I learned from the absolute best," Jesse replies defensively, shocked at how genuinely proud he is to admit it. "Lemme give you an idea of the full parameters here. Saul said you've got this secret bunker-type deal where people stay till you move 'em along. We need to turn that into an emergency room for, like, as long as it takes to get Mr. White back on his feet, or at least get him stable."

"If I get any clients, that'd cause problems," the guy warns. "My day-to-day normal clients might cause problems, even." He idly scratches his cheek. "I might have to close for, I don't know, renovations, you get my drift? And you guys must be after relocation services, too. Making two people disappear is harder than one, especially when you already did one of 'em."

"Yeah, I know," Jesse says, nodding to indicate to Badger and Skinny Pete that they should follow Dr. Goodman and crew inside; he needs a second here. "He blew his cover. He's a fucking asshole. I get that." He shoves his hands in his pockets. "Whatever you want. Name your price."

"Two point five million," says the Disappearer, without missing a beat. "The point five's for having to close."

"Suits me just fine," Jesse says, offering the dude his hand, actually flat-out shocked he's not asking for an even three. He'd done some rough math on his phone on the trip over, and, if what Badger and Pete are saying is right, they must've grabbed somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty-five to forty million and change. Sure, that means like half the green's going to rot away in that storage shed, but it gives Jesse a fuck-ton of satisfaction knowing that Mr. White will be ripshit when he hears about it. "Done deal, Mr.—?"

"Ed's all you need to call me," says the vacuum-repair guy, shaking Jesse's hand. "Mr. Pinkman."

"Mr. Ed," laughs Jesse, swaying at Ed's strong grip. "Just like the talking horse on Nick at Nite."

"I'll need to direct your friends to their workspace," Ed sighs, already heading inside. "See about mocking up some signs about the closure. I'll have to get straight to work on the rest of it, too."

"Dude, nah," Jesse says, trailing after him, glancing at the gate to make sure he'd padlocked it. "You should get some sleep." He wants to check Badger's and Pete's cars to make sure they're locked, but there isn't time. He feels better the second the warehouse door closes behind them.

While Ed apologizes to Dr. Goodman about the state of things and leads him to wherever the secret room is, Jesse's left alone with a bunch of dusty fucking vacuum cleaners and Badger and Pete looking kind of shaky and vulnerable, like they don't know what's next and just want to go home.

"Here's what we're gonna do," Jesse sighs, stepping closer to both of them, eyes lowered, proverbial hat in hand. "We're gonna go back outside and unload the luggage. We're gonna bring it in here and count it while Dr. Goodman saves Mr. White's life. Once that's done, you guys are gonna take a million each and get the hell out of here. You deserve it for putting up with this shit-show."

"We don't even know how much we grabbed, man!" sputters Badger, reaching for Jesse, shaking him. "You're being, like, way casual with how much of this shit you're handing out, I'm just sayin'."

"Too right, yo," Pete agrees, but he adds a hand to Badger's against Jesse's shoulder. "Listen, is this gonna be, like, the last time we ever see you? Not to get mushy on you all of a sudden, but this is getting way too real."

"Oh, like it wasn't real enough for you before?" Jesse demands, roughly shaking them both off. He can feel exhaustion clamping down harder, and that's when he remembers he's got a cigarette behind his ear. He snatches it and sticks it in his mouth, jerking his head toward the door. "C'mon."

Once they're outside, he makes Badger hand over his lighter. The first drag hits Jesse's lungs like the poison it is; he hasn't had a cigarette in six months, maybe, because Todd had been a stingy, twisted motherfucker and had sometimes given him ice cream instead. He's still coughing when he takes the second drag, but there it is, there's the kick, the rush. He laughs out loud.

"Dude, are you sure you're not, like, losing your mind?" Pete asks, one hand on the back-door handle while Badger, up front, unlocks the car and pops the trunk. "Word on the street says you moved to fucking Alaska. Where have you been?"

"Where do you think I've been?" Jesse demands, starting in on unloading the trunk. "You saw those bodies 'cause Mr. White killed them all. Didn't you see all the shackles and chains out there? Or that, like, hole in the ground where they kept me?"

Badger actually drops his car keys as he comes to help Pete unload the back seat. "Shit."

"So that's why you look like some hick or somethin', no offense," Pete says, tone somber.

"Ain't got time to think about this," Jesse grits out, his hands starting to shake as he piles bag after bag after bag on the pavement. He watches Badger and Pete pull one more load out of the back seat, and then they move over to Pete's car. "That haul's like...five duffel bags and six backpacks?" Jesse watches Pete pop the trunk of his car. "How 'bout in this one?"

Badger's already racing to Pete's popped trunk, dragging out two, no, three backpacks in one go, and then comes a duffel bag and a carry-on size suitcase. "You're gonna flip, dude."

All in all, there are nine average-size duffel bags, thirteen backpacks, and the suitcase. Jesse is impressed as fuck at how much they'd managed to cram, because this isn't even counting the backpacks he'd handed over to Dr. Goodman and to Ed, or the fifty thousand he'd given Wendy. He nods, wordless with approval, and picks up a couple of the nearest backpacks.

It takes them about twenty minutes to get it all inside. Jesse realizes that counting this shit with the likes of Pete and Badger for assistance isn't worth the effort. Instead of telling them to get started, he dumps out one of the duffel bags while, frozen, they watch. Takes long enough for him to count out two hundred of the goddamn banded stacks of hundreds, tossing them into the duffel bag one by one. "Two million," he says finally, zipping the bag up. "Enjoy it in good health."

"I ain't exactly been clean in a while, but," says Pete, "my cat keeps me grounded, you know?"

Badger grins at both of them, nervous, kind of giddy. "That moderation bullshit's kinda dope."

"Listen, you guys could be using the Blue as bath crystals for all I care," Jesse says, rubbing his nose, wishing he'd thought to grab a second cigarette. He won't ask either of them to surrender one, not after what he's put them through. "Take your money and get the fuck outta here."

What stuns him isn't that their quick, simultaneous movement isn't toward the duffel bag. It's that both of them latch onto him at the same time, and it's, like, the world's most awkward group hug.

"Guess you won't even be Jesse anymore," Badger chokes out. "Like, where's Ed gonna send you?"

"Don't know," Jesse says, giving in, letting his head drop to Badger's shoulder. "Don't really care."

"Aw, Jesus, man," moans Skinny Pete, shaking like he might actually be starting to cry and shit, which is not going to help Jesse on that front. "We've been friends for, like, ever."

"Yeah, and you're gonna get along without me," Jesse tells him, lifting his head, shifting his grasp over to Pete. He claps both Pete's shoulders, lowering his voice. "Take care of Badge, huh?"

"Bitch, I can fucking hear you," says Badger, teary, in irritation. "Why do I need—"

"Because I say so," Jesse replies, disentangling himself from both of them, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "Have you guys got more shit than usual for brains, or what? Get. The fuck. Out."

Pete shakes his head at Jesse, pale eyes somber under the artificial light, and then hefts up the duffel bag unaided with all that surprising, wiry strength. Beside him, Badger gives Jesse a sad, small wave before turning his back. Jesse backpedals, watching them load the duffel into the trunk of Pete's car before each of them before Badger returns to his own. He can't stand to linger, so he stalks back inside vacuum-cleaner purgatory, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides.

Ed's sitting on a stool behind the service desk; he's turned on a few lights. He's staring at the money still scattered on the floor, taking stock of the epic luggage pile. "You don't even know how much you've got, do you?" he asks, whistling low between his teeth. "How much he's got."

"You don't like to say his name, do you?" Jesse shoots back, gathering up stray stacks of cash a few at a time, shoving them into other bags here and there till the mess is cleaned up. "How come?"

Ed shrugs. "I think you know the answer to that," he says, gesturing Jesse over to the counter. He pulls a bottle of Jack Daniel's and two scratched-up shot glasses out from underneath. "He won't take no for an answer. What's worse is, he knows how to get that yes he's looking for."

Jesse knocks back the shot without thinking twice. "This wasn't his idea, just so we're clear."

Ed drinks his shot in a few measured sips, regarding Jesse with puzzlement. "Is that right?"

"Like, earlier, couple of hours back?" Jesse leans hard on the counter. "He asked me to kill him. I kid you not, he asked me to put a fucking bullet in his head. This ain't what he wants."

"Then why go to such trouble to keep him alive?" Ed ventures, patiently refilling the shot glasses.

"Because it ain't what he wants," Jesse laughs, clinking his glass against Ed's before sucking the second shot down. "Also because the money's his, and it'll, like, royally piss him off."

"Do you want him alive?" Ed presses on, drinking his second shot much faster than his first.

Jesse sets down his shot glass, staring at his hands. They're clean, but cut-up, and he's glad the sleeves of his shitty Walgreens plaid are just slightly too long. "Let's just say he's saved my life more times than he's tried to kill me," he sighed. "I know what you're gonna say, but I don't wanna hear it right now. He might be the asshole to end all assholes, but that kinda counts for something."

"At what cost, kiddo?" Ed asks, suddenly weary. Goddamn, this dude and his questions.

"Knowing he can't say jack shit anymore," Jesse spits. "Knowing I got us out of the clusterfuck back there, that I'm the one in charge." Knowing only the worst happens when we escape each other's orbit, knowing—

He registers Ed's expectant expression before he registers the footsteps behind him, the tap on his shoulder. He turns to see Dr. Goodman, still all suited up in surgery kit and bloody blue gloves, standing in front of him. He feels his heart hammer in his chest, chokes down the bile in his throat.

"No bullet," says Dr. Goodman. "As clean as I'd hoped for, so I stitched him up inside and out. However, he's lost just enough blood," he continues carefully, "that I'd prefer to err on the side of a transfusion. To answer your question from earlier, I don't have the blood. It wouldn't have lasted this long. For future reference, the shelf-life is around forty days. But I have something better."

Jesse swallows, nodding, his mind whirring. "Right on, right on," he said, "so is it synthetic—"

"Mr. White's blood type is A-positive," explains Dr. Goodman, patiently, "and yours is A-negative."

"Yeah, you told me that one time, like, ages ago," Jesse replies. "Down in Juárez. So?"

"You're the only compatible donor at my disposal," Dr. Goodman says, and there it is, bombshell.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me," Jesse hisses, but, in spite of his surge of fury, he's already unbuttoning the cuffs of his shirt-sleeves and rolling them up. He doesn't give a shit now if Ed sees the damage he's taken, and he's actually kind of relieved to be showing it off to a doctor.

"If you'd come with me, I'll prep you, get the transfusion process underway, and then have a look at those," says Dr. Goodman, indicating Jesse's wrists. "Any other injuries that I should know about?"

"Yeah, my ankles," Jesse says, following Dr. Goodman without so much as a goodnight to Ed. "Some, uh, what would you call 'em, abrasions around, like, my middle and everything, too."

Doctor Goodman casts a cool, mildly concerned glance over his shoulder as they reach the stairs. "Would you mind filling me in on how you sustained these?" he inquires on the way down.

"Yeah, I'd mind a fucking lot," Jesse replies, leaving it at that, taking a seat next to Walt's bed like the nurse with startling hazel eyes and black, pulled back hair instructs him. When he doesn't make a move to take off his own shirt, the nurse just does it for him; he sits there like a rag-doll or a stuffed animal or something, eyes fixed on Mr. White with his oxygen mask and bandages and fragile-seeming, exposed skin. He's seen Mr. White's faded surgery scar before, but it stands out faint, livid purple somehow under the terrible lighting. He feels an alcohol swab cool against his arm, and then the burn of a butterfly needle's entry. For a second, he thinks he might vomit.

"You want me to give you something for the nausea?" asks the hazel-eyed nurse, in accented English, and Jesse blinks at them. He can't tell what kind of person he's interacting with, dude or lady or otherwise. Doesn't matter. Gratefully, he licks his lips and nods, and it turns out the other nurse, big and beardy behind his clinical mask, is already on hand with an injection that gets plunged so swiftly into Jesse's right bicep that he scarcely feels it. "This is Zofran," says hazel-eyes. "It may also help you fall asleep faster."

Big-and-beardy says something to them in Spanish, and then pats Jesse's shoulder. "Worst's over."

Inside like sixty seconds, Jesse feels drowsy, at which point he's dimly aware the nurses have shoved a pillow between his head and the cinderblock wall so he can just loll there while they take off his shoes and socks and do shit to his wrists and ankles. Some of it stings, but it's not enough to prevent him from drifting off. He feels warm and weirdly protected.

Jesse wakes briefly when somebody manhandles him away from the back of the chair and the pillow for a few seconds to wrap a blanket around him, because, huh, he's still shirtless. Next thing he knows, there's more Spanish and he's being bodily moved to a rough-sheeted mattress and his jeans and boxers are being tugged off him and somebody's examining him from shoulders to torso with careful, gloved fingers.

If the worst's over, he thinks, surrendering to oblivion, then the next-worst's coming.

 * * *

Jesse wakes up groggy and, briefly, he panics. There's an IV stuck in the back of his hand, and he does not remember how that got there; gasping for breath, he flails so hard with both arms in an effort to sit up that he almost yanks the needle out. He curls forward, cradling his left hand to his chest, shivering and disoriented. He can tell he's in nothing but boxers under his hospital gown, which has also appeared out of nowhere, and he's got gauze bandages around his wrists and ankles and, oh. Patches of gauze around his waist, too, because the tape pulls when he moves.

He turns his head slowly to the right, his ear drawn by the soft beeping of equipment just as much as his eye's drawn by the fact that, shit, his bed and Mr. White's are lined up parallel to as to share all the gadget hook-ups in the middle. There's just a little too much space between them for Jesse to reach out with his right hand and touch Mr. White's elbow, but there'd be no need.

Mr. White is awake, lying there with his head turned toward Jesse and his nostrils flaring around the breathing-tube stuck in them. His color is better than before, but he still looks kind of like death warmed over. Jesse is instantly reminded of Aunt Ginny's rougher days, and he just barely manages to shove off that collection of memories before his vision starts to blur. He lets his IV-saddled hand drop back into his sheet-and-blanket-covered lap, offering Mr. White a tentative wave.

"Would it be inappropriate," rasps Mr. White, through cracked lips, "to ask where the hell we are?"

"Maybe," Jesse replies, straightening his spine, leaning toward him. "We're safe, asshole."

"The more pertinent question is," Mr. White continues, squinting, "why am I still alive?"

So it's gonna be like this, huh? Jesse thinks, biting the inside of his cheek. He directs his gaze away from Mr. White for just long enough to collect his thoughts; he blinks at his needle-skewered hand in his lap and then makes a big show of studying the cotton-ball taped down against his inner right arm. He turns it outward so Mr. White can see, meeting Mr. White's gaze again.

"You're alive because I was the only compatible donor Dr. Goodman had at his disposal, bitch."

Mr. White's brow furrows, as if he's still too drugged to process this information. "Goodman?"

"Not Saul," Jesse clarifies, realizing how confusing that name must be given Mr. White hadn't been along for the ride to Mexico. "Gus Fring's, like, former personal doctor. Saved him and Mike."

Mr. White pulls a face, lips twisting in disgust. "Jesse, are we by any chance being held prisoner?"

"No, Walt, we're not," Jesse retorts, flopping back against his crappy pillow as hard as he dares. "Ain't nobody left to hold us. It's pretty clear to me that you're not operating at full mental capacity right now, so I'm not gonna tell you, like, where we are or how we got here 'cause I'm too fucking tired to explain this shit to your doped-up ass. The simple answer is that you got stitched up, I gave you some of my blood because you lost a ton, and we're gonna sleep this shit off like some kinda bad dream."

"Some kind of bad dream," Mr. White echoes, brow furrowing deeply. "Jesse, they had you—"

"I know where they had me," Jesse seethes, swinging his legs out of bed before he realizes how hard that's going to yank his IV line and, fuck, does it sting. He's bent over Mr. White before he can get his fury under control, gripping the guy's chin with his right hand while his left arm's extended helplessly behind him so the needle doesn't pull out. "You don't."

It's satisfying to hear Mr. White's breath ratchet up a notch in outright fear. "I'm listening, Jesse."

Letting go of him roughly, Jesse backs down, feeling suddenly self-conscious about the fact that he's barefoot and the floor's cold and his stomach's growling up a storm. But he can't let this go, can't not take the opportunity to let this asshole know exactly what he's been through, or at least a piece of it, so he stands there while Mr. White's glassy, concerned eyes bore into him.

"Mr. White, lemme try to paint this picture for you, like, nice and clear," he says, taking an unsteady breath. "You know how we had Krazy-8 shut up in my basement way back in the day? Precious memories, right? It was almost exactly like that, except I had to spend like ten hours a day cooking for those douchebags, and nobody was cutting the crusts off my sandwiches."

At first, Mr. White doesn't say anything. But Jesse's last words, those and the tears streaming helplessly down his cheeks now—like, goddamn, can he just not be the pussy Jack and his fuckwads were constantly telling him he was for like five seconds?—appear to have hit their mark. Suddenly, Mr. White's jaw is trembling and he's making a sound of unearthly despair Jesse knows he's heard before.

Only this time, it's not for Hank Schrader. It's for him.

"You should have..." Mr. White's in tears, too, so the fact that Jesse's crying doesn't matter. "You should've killed me when I gave you the fucking chance on a platter! Jesse, you—"

"Stupid junkie prick?" Jesse suggests helpfully, hiccuping on another sob, collapsing back onto the edge of his mattress. He's dizzy and worn-out and has nothing to blow his nose on except the sheets, so that's exactly what he does. He can't bring himself to look at Mr. White, can't bear it.

"—had every right," Mr. White finishes, voice hollow like the rattle of his ever-present cough.

"Shit, Mr. White," Jesse hiccups, screwing his eyes shut, curling up against his pillow. "I don't know, like...even if that's true, what good would it have done either of us? Like, okay, wanting to be dead. I tried to want it, had every reason to want it while those assholes had me, but there was, like, this rosy-tinted or whatever part of my brain that just..." He gasps into the pillowcase, wondering where the fuck the nurses are and why nobody has come to give them fucking sedatives given the racket they're making. "Wouldn't, Mr. White. Couldn't do it."

"There's more blood on my hands than yours," says Mr. White, unevenly, like he still hasn't gotten his tears under control. "My death would've expunged it. Now, we're both stuck with the sight."

"Well, excuse me, Lady Macbeth," Jesse retorts. The metaphor's kind of forced, but.

Unexpectedly, Mr. White lets out a short, delirious bark of laughter. After that, he coughs for a little while; Jesse wants to launch himself out of bed again, but he doesn't. After that, Mr. White's silent.

Jesse opens his eyes when someone's hand falls on his arm. The hazel-eyed nurse is peering at him.

"Mr. White is asleep," says the nurse, eyes crinkling in concern. "Can I get you something to eat?"

"Yeah," Jesse says, but he makes no move to sit up, much less roll over. "Hey, what's your name?"

"Paz," says the nurse, leaving him to stew on that with another gentle squeeze of Jesse's shoulder.

 * * *

Turns out Ed is a man of many, many more talents than the many of which Jesse is already aware. It's seven days out from the gut-spilling, shrieking-match fiasco and, mercifully, he's sitting here, freshly shaved, on an antique bar-stool while Ed cuts his hair. He has no idea how much like his old self he's going to look, not with these fucking scars on his face. He's tired of feeling mangy.

Mr. White hasn't been awake much, mostly owing to the fact that he keeps coughing (Dr. Goodman thinks it's that creepy inflammation in his lungs instead of anything more sinister) and needs to be almost constantly sedated so his wounds can heal. They still can't get Mr. White properly X-rayed or PET-scanned, so there's no way of knowing if his more recent chemo has made a difference. There's also no way of knowing if it's safe to start that shit up again, but Dr. Goodman had reassured Jesse after an extensive chemo-administration tutorial that there's enough drugs and needles in the boxes he's leaving them for, like, at least a year's worth of treatments.

Jesse had thanked him and retorted that, jeez, maybe he should've just gone to nursing school.

Paz, listening in on the conversation, had said that wasn't a half-bad idea. Jesse had stared.

"Kiddo, you've gotta hold still," Ed sighs, setting both hands, even the one wielding scissors, on Jesse's shoulders. "I can't give you a halfway decent cut here if you keep changing the angle."

"Are you tryin' to tell me you didn't actually train as a barber, too?" Jesse jokes. "Am I gonna look like ass in my new passport and driver's license photos? Or can you photoshop out the suck?"

"I can photoshop out a hell of a lot, but a bad 'do isn't one of those things," Ed says, combing through Jesse's hair, doing that test-tug-for-length thing all over. Jesse doesn't have a mirror in front of him, so there's no way of knowing how well the guy's doing with the concept of texturization.

"Like we've gotta get Mr. White up here kinda soon," Jesse observes pensively. "For photos."

"We need to get the guy looking less like himself first," Ed replies. "Even with hair, he's too recognizable." He's quiet for a few seconds, and then snip, snip, snip. "If he shaves..."

Jesse tries to picture Mr. White with the mess currently on his head and no facial hair.

"That's just weird," he blurts, halting his feet mid-twitch. "So weird it might actually work."

At another tap from Ed against the back of his neck, Jesse clamps his still-bandaged ankles down on the stool-legs and holds his body rigid. He's always been jittery, but it seems like a more pervasive thing than ever before. He doesn't want to look too closely at why that might be, either.

"What's my name gonna be?" Jesse asks, hoping mouth-movement is okay. "Thought it up yet?"

"It's less a process of thinking-up and more a process of assigning you a pre-existing identity that nobody else is currently using," Ed says, feathering his fingers through Jesse's hair before spritzing it again and combing it out. "Walt made a terrible Mr. Lambert, but he might make a decent Martin Dedham. As for you, I'm stuck between Carl Page and Bruce Devereaux. What do you think?"

"My middle name is Bruce," says Jesse, quietly. "Devereaux is a dope last name and all, but..."

"Then, Carl," replies Ed, tugging the towel off Jesse's shoulders, "why don't you go have a look?"

Before Jesse can hop off the stool, Dr. Goodman, Joaquín, and Paz stride into the cluttered workshop space wearing civilian clothes.

They've all got suitcases in hand, neat and professional, looking like they're off on a business trip. Jesse realizes abruptly that they're not taking the few pieces of equipment they hadn't bothered to pack up the night before. And with the money Jesse's paying them, why should they even worry?

"There's a job coming up south of the border," Dr. Goodman says, studying Jesse more closely than usual. "I'm confident you can take over what care Mr. White requires from this point forward. When the latest round of sedation wears off, don't give him more. You'll need him conscious."

"Shame, too, like, 'cause it's so peaceful when he's asleep," says Jesse, sweetly, hopping off the stool. He shakes Dr. Goodman's hand, clearing his throat. "Dr. Goodman, I can't—thank you."

"You're not obliged to, Mr. Pinkman," Dr. Goodman reassures him amiably, releasing Jesse's hand.

Joaquín, ever the silent partner, just gives Jesse a curt, smiling nod. But Paz, who's knock-out gorgeous and still not any gender Jesse considers himself familiar with, embraces him.

"Wherever you're going, you be careful," Paz whispers. "Men like el cabrón are no end of trouble."

"I'll call him that to his face if he misbehaves," Jesse says, hugging back hard. "Promise."

Just like that, Jesse and Ed are alone again. While Ed whips out the broom and starts to sweep up, Jesse dashes back downstairs to have a look in the tiny, shitty mirror on the back wall of the room.

"Jesse, I don't know if you're aware," remarks Mr. White, and, huh, Jesse hadn't even registered that he's awake, "but you look approximately like someone out of my tenth-grade yearbook."

Jesse reaches the mirror, breathless, and his stomach drops through the floor. Mr. White is, infuriatingly, correct. He looks like he fell out of the 1970s, and not one of the cool parts. "Don't be dissin' my man Mr. Ed," he replies peevishly. "He did the best he could, all right?"

"I wouldn't worry about it," Mr. White says, dropping the mild sarcasm. "You can get it cut any way you want once we make it to our final destination." He pauses, pensive. "Any word on that?"

"Nope," replies Jesse, turning around, crossing the room to stand next to Mr. White's bed. He's sitting propped up against a pile of pillows, and it's weird as shit, because he looks almost healthy. Impulsively, Jesse takes a seat on the mattress next to Mr. White's blanket-covered feet. "But I found out that you're gonna be known as Martin Dedham, and I'm stuck with Carl Page."

"Carl and Martin," Mr. White echoes, like he's tasting the damn names. "It could be worse." Something beneath the surface of his affability darkens, manifesting as a mean glint in his grey-green eyes. "Jesse, perhaps I've been wrong to err on the side of caution, but I need to ask: how exactly are we paying for all of the elaborate services you've engaged in the past week?"

"Oh, like, that's easy," Jesse says, feeling his stomach coil tight in spite of how low-key he's playing this. "The night we hauled your ass down here, I sent Badger and Skinny Pete out to pick up some of your cash. Those Nazi fuckheads had it in loads of luggage and stuff in one of their sheds."

Mr. White's expression turns so cold Jesse instantly regrets thinking he might get away with this.

"How much of my money did they retrieve," he says flatly, "and how much of it did you pay out?"

Jesse screws his eyes shut, ready to rattle off the accounting he's had prepped for a few days now.

"Minus fifty thousand to shut Wendy up, a million each to Badger and Skinny, two point five million to Ed, and, uh, five million to the medical team, there's exactly thirty-two million, four hundred and twenty thousand left. I counted it last night, just for you. You're welcome."

When Jesse opens his eyes, Mr. White looks like he's doing his best to stave off one of those, what's he call them, apoplectic fits or something. He's doing a decent job, too, until he bursts out, red-faced, voice cracking, "Jesse, would you please stop just giving away my money! And at that kind of exorbitant fee, you damned well should've sent Brandon and Pete back for the rest!"

"Yo, asshole, they couldn't grab it all! I wasn't just gonna put them back in harm's way!"

"Do you even understand how paltry this makes the nine million I left in trust with Gretchen and Elliott for my kids look?" Mr. White says, and then, abruptly, all the hot air's gone from him. He swallows, clutching his side like he's hurt himself or something. "Look, Jesse, I'm—"

"Do you even understand how petty you're being after all of that damage you undid the other night with your automatic murder machine and, like, saving my life?" Jesse demands, teeth gritted, furious, but all he can think is don't cry don't cry don't cry. "Do you know what I gave up for this? Like, seriously, if the sum total of what you've taken from me wasn't high enough already, I had to say goodbye to my two best fucking friends in the world! All for this, okay? Do you get it?" Screw it, he's dripping tears on the blankets over Mr. White's feet; he's grabbing Mr. White's ankle like he means to break it. "All for you!"

"I'm sorry," blurts Mr. White, looking like he might fall apart again, too. It's something they have in common now, this fucked-up fragility, and it's the only thing standing between Jesse and hating this piece of work as much as he'd come to eight and a half months ago. "Jesse, I can't...take any of this back. I wanted to pay for it, blood for blood, but you wouldn't let me. Instead, you gave me some of yours. This isn't what I..."

"Dude," Jesse laughs hysterically, letting go of Mr. White's ankle, thumping the mattress, "it's totally not, like, what I had planned either, all right? I can tell you a dozen better plans we could've made, Mr. White, but we blew through all those warning barriers without losing steam."

He's so busy trying to wipe his dripping nose on his sleeve that it takes him about five full seconds to realize that Mr. White is scooting his way painstakingly down the bed, wincing, presumably with intent to get closer to Jesse. When their eyes lock, Mr. White's expression turns sheepish.

"Come here," he says softly, muffling a brief coughing fit behind his hand. "Jesse, I wish—"

If wishes were horses, Jesse thinks, just like Aunt Ginny used to say, and practically launches himself into Mr. White's arms. Yeah, he hopes to God it hurts the guy, like, a lot, but he's just so desperate for human contact that isn't a nurse there-there shushing him. He burrows into Mr. White totally sober this time, clinging to Mr. White's neck and mouthing angry, wet nothings. Then beggars might ride.

When Ed comes downstairs ten minutes later to tell them they'd better be ready to roll out in forty-eight hours, that's how he finds them: curled together under Mr. White's blankets. Jesse feels his heart-rate rise, but Mr. White's is steady and slow.

"Thank you," is all Mr. White says, tucking Jesse closer against his chest, holding him tightly.

Jesse watches as Ed, shaking his head, just gives up on responding and leaves the room again. 

 * * *

Jesse studies their surroundings as objectively as he can, trying his best to pretend this isn't tripping off his tendency toward semi-claustrophobia like whoa. He'd taken an anti-anxiety pill about an hour before, and it's starting to make him dizzy. For some reason, cooking on the Ship had never bugged him much; he and Mr. White had worked out their patterns of movement, like some delicate dance, down to an actual fucking science. Why does he even miss it? His sense of nostalgia baffles him sometimes.

The truck they're now sitting in, on a beat-up old queen-size mattress covered in polyester sleeping bags and cover-less pillows, is roughly the same size as the Pollos Hermanos delivery trucks used to be. Mr. White is lying on his back next to Jesse, staring at the ceiling, while Jesse sits with his back up against the rattling wall and switches the flashlight on and off with increasing agitation.

"Jesse," murmurs Mr. White, gentler than ever, reaching out to take hold of Jesse's wrist. "Relax."

"I don't take orders from you anymore, remember?" Jesse reminds him, leaving the flashlight on.

"We have a couple more, but I don't want us to run out of batteries," Mr. White explains calmly.

"Yo, can't you just, I dunno, whip us up a couple more like you did that one time we got stuck in the desert?"

Jesse shines the flashlight in Mr. White's face, surprised to see that he's smiling. "I doubt there's anything in either our present luggage or our medical supplies that I could repurpose."

"Of course there is," Jesse informs him, switching the flashlight off. "You're an evil genius."

"We're about four hours into this trip," replies Mr. White, cautiously, "and, I don't know if you were paying attention when Ed explained this, our destination is thirty-three hours away. That's without pit-stops. He'll be taking them for his own benefit, but he won't be able to do much more for us than crack the roll-up door now and then to let in some fresh air. Assuming he's quick about his stops and doesn't sleep much, which I can tell you from past experience is the case, we're stuck in here for around forty hours minimum. If he's feeling sadistic, it could be closer to fifty."

"Two whole days in the dark with your grouchy ass for company and, like, empty soda bottles to piss in," Jesse mutters, tossing aside the flashlight. "Ain't I just won the lottery or somethin'."

"This is the fucking Hilton in comparison to what I had the first time around," says Mr. White.

"Yeah?" Jesse asks, wriggling down so that he's lying on his side against his pile of pillows instead, able to squint levelly at Mr. White through the not-quite-darkness. "How'd he smuggle you to NH?"

Mr. White's rueful laughter gives way to a brief, rattling cough. "In an empty propane-tank truck."

"I'm kinda disappointed it was empty," Jesse jokes, wondering if the part of him that's still clinging to the hate-facet of his complex relationship with this guy next to him even means it. "That totally blows, though. I bet Mr. Ed couldn't fit more than a couple of blankets in there."

"My back wasn't in the best state for a while afterward," Mr. White agrees, easily ignoring the dig.

Tentatively, Jesse scoots closer to him. They're now working under an unspoken assumption of cuddling-for-comfort-is-kosher-because-we're-both-irreparably-fucked-up, and Jesse's still starved for all of the warmth and kindness he can get. He hadn't left Mr. White's bed for the rest of the day after Ed found them like that, and not for the rest of the night, either. Or the one after.

"Guess maybe I'm gonna have to work on your shoulders once we're outta here, huh," he says.

Mr. White turns gingerly onto his injured side so he can face Jesse, peering at him in confusion.

"It's bad enough you're stuck with being my substitute physician, let alone my massage therapist."

Jesse shrugs, scooting forward another fraction, draping his arm across Mr. White's hip; he's feeling too jittery about the overall situation to even care that he's not really thinking this through. "So what?"

"So, I'm unclear as to why you think it's acceptable to throw your life away," Mr. White sighs.

"Asshole, let me explain this to you since your brain's still way fucked up by the meds," Jesse says, getting right in Mr. White's face so that their noses almost touch. "I know you might not believe this, because, like, I know you've spent about as much time as I did for a while there convincing yourself that you're the bad guy, but I kinda chose what happened to me every step of the way. And I guess the main difference here is that, like, you are the bad guy, but I've more than proved what a dipshit I am for always choosing you. I'm an adult dipshit, okay? Just 'cause you taught my ass in high school doesn't mean I didn't have some kind of agency in all of this. D'you know what rehab taught me, at least in part? Responsibility."

Mr. White doesn't say anything for a few seconds, and he doesn't blink, either. "Responsibility?"

"Yo, I own my shit now," says Jesse, shrugging, letting his fingers curl at the small of Mr. White's back. "And, hey, just my luck, you're part of that shit. I'm, like, kinda the boss of you now."

Mr. White's lips twitch, settling on amusement. "The boss of me, huh? Is that right?"

"Yeah, Mr. White. So if I, like, I dunno, wanna do something as illogical as this," Jesse insists, tilting his head at just the right angle to set his lips firmly against Mr. White's, just resting them there, not quite kissing him, a challenge, "then it's my prerogative, you follow?"

"I don't get a say?" Walt asks, letting his lips move against Jesse's with deliberation. "None at all?"

"Nope," Jesse informs him, impulsively swiping his tongue across Mr. White's lower lip. "None."

"Then you'd better get on with teaching me whatever lesson this is, son," Mr. White says mildly.

"Son? Son? You son of a bitch," Jesse hisses, infuriated and improbably turned-on all in the same breath, and the decision to push this charade the rest of the way off the cliff is easy.

After a minute of shameless, sloppy making out, Jesse is stunned that neither one of them is getting hard from this just yet. They're biting at each other's lips, pressing into each other, and breathing into each other's mouths between fits of some serious tongue action. It's nice.

"How can you even be into this when you're feeling like crap?" Jesse huffs in amazement, upping the ante by shoving his thigh up harder between Mr. White's. "Also, you might not actually want this, which is, not gonna lie, part of why I suspect I, like, could kinda get off on it?"

Mr. White blinks, sleepy with painkillers and a little lust-hazed. "Do you hear me complaining?"

"Shit, no," Jesse sighs, nuzzling into Mr. White's top layers to get at his neck. "Shoulda listened to Wendy all those times, like she's totally seen enough freaks like you to know what's goin' on—"

"I would never," says Mr. White, his fingers uncurling between Jesse's shoulder blades, and for some reason Jesse believes him, "have done this unless you'd indicated that you wanted—"

"Yeah, and," Jesse continues, not bothering to respond directly to what Mr. White's just said, biting down harder on Mr. White's jugular than he needs to, making the guy gasp and jerk against him, "that hit you took out on me was kinda this massive give-away on your part, doncha think?" He blinks back tears, sucking the spot harder, and then bites down again. He wants to make Mr. White answer for this, make him feel it. "It's like if you can't have me, nobody else can?"

"You of all people should know I'm not the most adept at demonstrating affection," Walt murmurs, his breathing gone shaky while Jesse works on giving him what's hopefully the most vicious hickey of his life. "Besides, you may be the boss of me now, but you're still—"

"Nuh-uh," Jesse cuts him off, suddenly annoyed, giving Mr. White one more taste of teeth and, yeah, damn, they're both kind of wound-up now. "Ain't yours unless I say so, asshole," he hisses, rolling out from under Mr. White's arm even though it's been cradling him oh-so-sweetly and shit.

"—you're still the one I chose, too," Mr. White continues quietly, letting him go, leaving it at that.

Jesse screws his eyes shut, fumbling off the edge of the mattress for the flashlight. He wants to touch himself so bad right now it isn't even funny, but he'd like it even more if Mr. White touched him, and that's even less funny. His back's to the guy, and he listens as Mr. White rolls away with a harsh exhalation. Dude will probably just go back to sleep and leave Jesse halfway to blue balls and whatever the fuck else Jesse plans to do, which, now that he's found the flashlight, is relocate the bottle of Xanax that Paz had given him and take a high enough dose to pass out.

 * * *

Jesse wakes up to Mr. White shaking him so hard that his teeth are fucking rattling in his skull.

"...Jesse, Jesse!" Mr. White's gritting out, increasingly distressed. "Oh, thank God."

"Jesus, what'sa matter?" asks Jesse, yawning thickly, not so groggy that he doesn't notice how close Mr. White's looming, kneeling next to him on the mattress with his left palm braced against the pillow right alongside Jesse's cheek. He leans up and pecks Mr. White's chin, hazily remembering the fraught exchange they'd had. "Hey, guess I was bein' a douchebag not too long ago, like—"

For half a second, Mr. White looks like he can't decide whether to cry or to throttle Jesse, but he settles on pressing a kiss against the corner of Jesse's mouth. "Not too long ago?" asks Mr. White, incredulous, shifting away with a wince so he can lie back down. "You were completely unresponsive for about five full minutes. Do you even realize how long you've been asleep?"

"Nope," Jesse admits, yawning again, rolling over so he can snuggle up to Mr. White, because he's still just enough under the influence of those pills to want to conk right back out. "M'sorry."

"Around twelve hours," says Mr. White, flatly, letting Jesse latch onto him. "What did you take?"

"Fucking prescription," Jesse reassures him. "The stuff Paz gave me for, like, anxiety and shit."

"I woke up once a bit earlier and tried to wake you then," Mr. White replies. "You didn't budge, but I was too tired to panic. Went back to sleep myself. Hell, maybe I ought to take some of that."

"Hell no, you got your painkillers," says Jesse, peevishly, nuzzling into Mr. White's chest. He's less in the mood to try his hand at seduction again, because look at how well that had gone, and more in the mood to just cuddle the shit out of anything he can reach. "S'all for me."

"We should probably eat something," says Mr. White, rubbing Jesse's elbow where it rests against his chest. "Our menu for this long-haul includes granola bars, turkey jerky, and more granola bars."

"Is the jerky that weird tequila-lime-teriyaki artisan stuff you always buy?" Jesse asks dejectedly.

"Mesquite," Mr. White says, rubbing his way up to Jesse's shoulder. "Ed didn't give us a choice."

"Mmm, that stuff's dope," Jesse says, making a grabby hand toward Mr. White's edge of the mattress, although his arm's gone to putty because of the attention Mr. White's lavishing on it.

"I won't ration anything out until we're sitting up like, as you phrased it, the adult dipshits we are."

"Well, this dipshit's gonna eat the jerky," insists Jesse, disentangling himself from Mr. White so that he can sit up and punch at the pillows behind him till he's comfortable. "All of it."

"Fifty-fifty," Mr. White shoots back, sounding like he's back in good humor, struggling to sit up.

"Not by the new rules," Jesse reminds him, helping out till they're leaning into each other and, wow, kissing slow and easy this time like eating doesn't matter. "Jerky is boss food," he mumbles stupidly against Mr. White's mouth, kissing from there down to the side of his neck.

"We're both eating a balanced diet, and that's that," says Mr. White, reaching for the plastic bag.

While they eat in companionable silence, Jesse thinks about resuming what they've started. He thinks about the relative merits of pinning Mr. White down, unbuttoning his shirt, and tasting anything that's not covered by gauze. He changes his mind about that pretty quickly, though, because, on the down-side, neither one of them has showered in over twelve hours now.

Mr. White offers him a sip from the bottle of water he's opened, and Jesse takes a few desperate swallows. His mouth's dry because of the meds and because he's thinking about getting laid while he's on the run from the law. Jesus Christ. If they weren't bad-ass before, they definitely are now. He tries to remember which Old West guys never got caught, although he knows he should be thinking of fugitives from modern times.

"Mr. White," he ventures, once they've finished the jerky and eaten several oat-and-honey granola bars each, once they're curled up warm and listless under the sleeping bags, "is this gonna work?"

"As long as we both manage to stay alive, it might," says Mr. White. "If I hadn't blown my cover, I very likely wouldn't have been found. And are you really going to keep calling me that?"

"I don't think I can start calling you Martin," Jesse sighs, fiddling with the buttons on the front of Mr. White's shirt. He's capable of thinking of the guy as Walt, but usually only if he's pissed off. He wonders if he ought to train himself out of that given he's gone rogue and decided he'd like to climb this asshole like a fucking tree. "Doing that in public's gonna be weird."

"Walt isn't such a dead give-away," says Mr. White, stilling Jesse's hand, caressing the backs of Jesse's fingers. "It's fewer syllables than Mr. White. Surely your lazy tongue can get behind that."

"Says who my tongue's lazy, asshole?" Jesse demands, letting his fingertips dig into Walt's belly a little, and, whoa, yeah. He turns the name over in his thoughts a few times, nuzzling into Walt's neck to lick at the same spot he'd left tender some hours before. "Walt," he adds.

"Jesse," Walt sighs, mouthing at the top of Jesse's head, almost a kiss. "You'll make an awful Carl."

"Did Mr. Ed take a pit-stop while we were asleep or what?" asks Jesse, irritably. "I need some air."

"He must have," replies Walt, darkly. "Otherwise, we probably would've experienced one by now." He switches on the flashlight, checking the cheap wristwatch Ed had given him. "Twenty hours since we left Albuquerque, give or take. At that rate, we've got between thirteen and fifteen left."

"So I was thinking about fugitives who never got caught, which is why I asked you that question," Jesse admits, uneasy, "but I couldn't think of any. I didn't pay enough attention in history class."

"Aribert Heim and James Bulger come to mind," says Walt, nuzzling Jesse's hair again, making Jesse shiver, "neither of whom I can say I admire. Bulger was finally caught this year."

"Yeah, 'cause like the only criminal you admire is yourself," Jesse retorts, feeling pretty drowsy.

"I don't know," Walt replies, pitched into a coughing fit that sends chills down Jesse's spine. "I wouldn't have formed such an attachment to the one lazing in my arms if that were the case."

"You got me there," Jesse mumbles, closing his eyes, too tired to even fight Walt's assertion.

The next fourteen hours and change are wretched. Jesse only sleeps for another four of them, by which time he wakes to find Walt withdrawn and obviously in pain even if he won't admit to it. He lays Walt out, switches on all three flashlights, and unbuttons Walt's shirt. He's not bleeding through his dressings or anything like that, but he is clammy and overheated like he might be running a temperature. Jesse swears, grabs one of the flashlights, and goes rummaging through their medical supplies down near the foot of the trailer where all of the money's sitting around in the same luggage the Nazis had put it in. He finds the vial of Keflex, relieved.

"Gotta get, like, a double dose of this in you to start," Jesse mutters, uncapping the water bottle.

"I'm accustomed to self-medicating with antibiotics," says Walt, irritably, shoving the pills in his mouth before taking a swallow when Jesse held the water to his lips. "It might not be an infection."

"Healing wound, possible fever, close quarters," Jesse says, putting everything away in his canvas tote-bag with the Xanax so it's much closer to hand. "I'm not takin' any chances, all right?"

"Even if I beat this cancer, which seems unlikely to me regardless of the lack of any recent data pointing either way," Walt replies gravely, "I will die much sooner than later."

"You don't know that," Jesse tells Walt, buttoning his shirt back up. "You don't know shit."

"I know that I won't have nearly as much time with you as I'd like," Walt says with earnest regret.

"If this is you bringing up that perfect moment crap again, cut it out," Jesse says, burrowing back under the sleeping bags next to him. "You haven't lived too long. You live as long as you live." He knows, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that his aspirations of keeping Walt alive out of vengeance amount to the biggest lie he's ever told himself. Maybe it was true in the moment, but now?

"I'd really, really like a couple of those pills you have," Walt says somewhat desperately.

Jesse gets up again, rummaging in his bag. He hands a couple of Xanax tablets to Walt, and, after having some more of the water that's left, hands that off to him, too. The entire situation's far too reminiscent of drugging Walt's coffee. Jesse manages to hold off tears until Walt's fallen asleep.

Ten hours later, he's still awake with Walt's head in his lap as the truck stops. Ed rolls up the door.

"Hey, kiddo," he says, backlit by afternoon sun, offering Jesse a tentative wave. "We're here."

Jesse nods, running his fingers through Walt's hair. "Hey," he says. "Mr. White. Walt."

"Hmmm, what?" mutters Walt, groggily, groaning when he tries to sit up. "Jesse...?"

"We're here," Jesse echoes dazedly, pointing at the green world outside. "I smell the ocean."

 * * *

Jesse runs his fingers along the damp, cracked ceiling plaster, checking the water damage's full extent.

"This place is a fixer-upper for sure," he says grimly, poking his index finger straight into the pulpy mess, brushing his hands off on his jeans. He turns on his aluminum-ladder perch, staring grimly down at Walt, who's still in bed with a book. "I'm gonna have to learn a whole new level of DIY."

"For what we paid, I'm impressed with the property's location," Walt admits. "Condition, not so much." He wrinkles his nose, and Jesse can't help but think for a second that he really does look like somebody else: clean-shaven, hair trimmed, different glasses. Sickly, but kind of handsome.

They'd spent their first forty-eight hours in the tumble-down cottage taking turns in the leaky shower, yawning their way into clean underwear, and sleeping off the trip. There were two bedrooms, but neither one of them had given the tiny guest-type deal a second look. On their first morning, the day before, Jesse had dragged Walt into town looking for a barber shop. He and Ed had convinced Walt to shave before they left, but that didn't change the fact Walt's hair had gone feral. Now, with a trim and some combing, he wasn't going to turn heads.

Jesse backs down the ladder, barefoot, in baggy jeans and the Against Me! t-shirt he'd found in one of the Gloucester thrift shops they'd hit up after haircuts. They're technically residents of Rockport, Massachusetts, but there's nothing actually in Rockport but seafood restaurants, souvenir shops, and this wacky dude called Captain Steve who sells rare seashells to tourists.

"Speaking of fixer-uppers," he says, climbing back onto the bed, "I hope the car doesn't die on us."

"What you see is what you get," says Walt, setting his book aside. "If it does, we'll buy a new one."

"Bet you never thought you'd see the ass-end of New England again this soon, huh?" Jesse asks, flipping back the covers so he can crawl in. They've literally been too tired to do anything except sleep and explore their surroundings, but Jesse's starting to feel restless. He studies Walt's face again, this time up close, reaching to tug off his glasses. Walt doesn't resist, but he's confused.

"I'd assumed Ed would steer clear of it, but maybe it's the same principle as your logic the night we escaped," Walt says, taking his glasses out of Jesse's hands, setting them on top of the book. "This is a wealthy area. It hasn't been a haven for ne'er-do-wells since the seventeen-hundreds."

"Ne'er-do-wells," Jesse repeats, settling into the curve of Walt's left arm. "What, like pirates?"

Walt nods, lost momentarily in reminiscence. "My son's school arranged a field trip to Salem one year, sixth grade or thereabouts, and Junior was devastated he couldn't travel with the group. I took him the summer after, just the two of us. He was more fascinated by the witch trials, but the local history of sea-faring commerce was what grabbed my attention. Marblehead, one of those towns just up the road? Might as well have been Tortuga, or at least that's what the tour guides said."

"We were the complete opposite of pirates," replies Jesse, pensively. "Desert everywhere." If Walt's cheerfully going to continue spouting dull reminiscences, he might as well make his move, take the guy by surprise. While Walt goes on about how the whole witch-hysteria got imported up the coast by ships sailing north from the Carolinas, Jesse spends a few minutes idly running his hand over Walt's belly through his t-shirt. Walt doesn't flinch when Jesse strokes his bandage, so Jesse takes that as a sign. He shifts into Walt's lap, setting his fingers against Walt's lips.

"Oh, I'm sorry," says Walt, sarcastically, but his mouth molds to the touch. "Was I boring you?"

"We could be doing something a lot more interesting than discuss local history," Jesse says, replacing his fingers with his mouth. It's easy to let his tongue push past Walt's lips, only there's a sharp new thrill to it because they aren't shut away in the stuffy dark. "What d'you think?"

In response, Walt kisses him back. It's slow and leisurely at first, like, totally fucking lethal how fast it melts Jesse's insides, but Walt suddenly freezes under him. Jesse pulls back, frowning.

"Do you honestly want to spend the rest of your foreseeable future with a man who, by all most recent accounts, is still dying? Who, if you recall, was responsible for the complete and utter ruin of not only you, but also several of your loved ones? For God's sake, Jesse. Why go to the trouble? Why forgive me? Why even believe I might make it? I don't even know if the chemo doses Ed administered during my time in New Hampshire did any good. Dr. Goodman can't just order a PET scan to find out," Walt seethes, raking his fingers through his hair. "I can't just go to a hospital."

"What did they say it was, like—a shadow? Wasn't that the word you used?" Jesse says, keeping his tone measured, hoping to disarm and lull him. "My point is that you've been on the run so long without check-ups that you don't even know. Sure, yeah, you were weak and coughing and shit, but I'd bet all your money it's because you were starved just like me, only you're dumb as fuck 'cause you were doing it to yourself." He lets it heat up now, catching his fingers mid-glide through his own hair: an unconscious mirroring. "As for the other stuff, hey, like I tried killing you or whatever a couple times, too. Does that mean we ever learned to steer clear? Nope. We're completely fucked for each other, Walt. Don't you get it? Of course your stubborn ass gets it, but you just won't admit it, will you? Every time I walk away, every time you walk away, every time you send me away, every time you run—" Fuck it, he can't breathe now; he's already got tears streaming down his cheeks, like, fat lot of good it's done him trying to play the tough-guy ever since they escaped New Mexico by the skin of their teeth. "It's gravity, asshole, or entropy, or—Jesus. It's blood like fucking magnets. I'm A-negative, you're A-positive. End of story."

Walt loosens his grasp on his own hair, his hands drifting in the direction of Jesse's shoulders. It looks like Jesse has hit a nerve, because Walt's always been weirdly susceptible to Jesse in hysterics. Furthermore, Jesse fucking knows it. Walt kisses Jesse's flooding eyelids like some penitent kissing the carved gaze of a saint, and that's exactly where Jesse wants him. Romeo and Juliet level shit, because, hey: he'd always been better at English class anyhow, and who's to say he's wrong for choosing Friar Laurence?

"This is all I can give you," Walt whispers, thumbing along Jesse's tear-slicked jaw. "What's left."

"I'm yours," Jesse says, melting into him, because, fuck, he's just so tired of fighting; he's just so tired of fighting, and he wants this, has wanted it maybe since the first instant he laid eyes on that clear miracle of a shard he'd held up with a pair of tweezers before his disbelieving eyes. "I'm yours, asshole, so, I don't know, just, like...take me already!"

"Shhh, Jesse," Walt soothes, mouthing a kiss against Jesse's temple, running all ten fingers hesitantly through Jesse's hair. "What do you want me to do? No offense, but that's...open-ended."

"I don't wanna feel so fucking alone anymore," Jesse gasps, too ashamed to say something like I want you to make me your bitch like in the good old days, only in the clingy-disgustingly-possessive-sex kinda way instead of in the clingy-disgustingly-possessive-meth kinda way.

"You're not alone," says Walt, kissing Jesse's cheek this time, and, God, who died and made him Casanova? "I'm here," he adds, kissing Jesse's other cheek, and then pulls back to look at Jesse with eyes full of something enough like heartbreak for Jesse to know that, yeah, it's for real. This is as close as he'll ever get to Walter fucking White begging his forgiveness, and, somehow, it's enough.

"Open-ended," Jesse mumbles, tipping forward against Walt's shoulder, not-so-subtly wiping his nose on Walt's t-shirt. "Shit, I don't even know. Ain't like I've ever done this with a guy before unless you count, like, that time I got blasted and sucked face with Badger's hot cousin from Tucson or somewhere. Never saw him again, never had to like...talk about it, or any of that awkward shit."

Walt's still stroking Jesse's hair with one hand, but he's also caressing his way down Jesse's back with the other in a way that suggests he might be willing to take the lead just like Jesse's asking him to. "You might've guessed this by now, but I wasn't involved with just Gretchen back in the day."

"Thank fucking God somebody here knows what to do with two dicks," Jesse mumbles with a nervous laugh. He means it as a joke, means it to lighten the mood, but Walt is looking at him with a kind of fierce tenderness that makes Jesse think they're both going to be naked in no time. He catches Walt's mouth, moaning into it, the sound unbearably needy even to his own ears.

Walt hums, letting Jesse burn off the burst of anxiety. "I'll let you in on a secret," he whispers against Jesse's lips, skimming his thumb along Jesse's waistband, working it underneath Jesse's shirt, rubbing Jesse's skin. "It's not that different from what you do with two of anything else."

"Asshole," Jesse groans, thrilled with the brush against his lower back, shoving his hips forward against Walt's without invitation. "Okay, so if that's how it's gonna be, you can start by, like, how about shoving your hand down the front of my pants instead of the back?"

"I thought you'd never ask," says Walt, his voice low and rough like Jesse hasn't heard it in way too long. He unfastens Jesse's jeans as if he's had plenty of practice, and his hand slips smoothly down the front of Jesse's boxers. It's simultaneously comforting and hot as fuck.

"Oh my God," Jesse groans, embarrassed how fast his eyes snap shut, but, seriously, Walt knows just what to do with his hand. He pushes into those warm, careful strokes for a solid minute, catching his lower lip between his teeth. He opens his eyes, hoping to see Walt out of his mind with want, and he's not disappointed. Curling forward, Jesse tries to get him to move faster, latching onto Walt's earlobe. "How 'bout you take 'em off?"

Walt stops stroking Jesse, the bastard, leaning forward to nip at Jesse's earlobe in kind. "Do you mean mine or yours?" he asks, a breathy, heated exhalation. "Or hadn't you decided?"

"Oh, fuck you," Jesse mutters, twisting out of Walt's lap just long enough to get the job done himself. Once he's kicked his shit to the floor, he half expects to have to yank Walt's boxers off him, but what he finds when he crawls back over to settle again is that Walt's already naked.

"Not this time," says Walt, as mildly as ever, but there's a smirk playing at the corners of his mouth as he molds his palms to Jesse's hipbones before tugging Jesse's t-shirt up and over his head.

Jesse can't think of anything to say to that, already leaning forward again, desperate for a kiss. He could start itemizing the entire laundry list of stuff he wants to try with Walt, but that would be counterproductive given that this moment is the one he's been patiently working up to. Literally all he's doing is shoving himself against Walt's belly, and skin-on-skin feels so good he can't hold back.

Walt's hands are gentle in his hair, so gentle, and that does it.

"Mr. White," he chokes, too late to give warning; he's coming all over his belly and Walt's and even Walt's bandage. He shudders into full contact with Walt's chest, eyes squeezed shut, ecstatic; he wonders if he's imagining the way Walt, breathing fast, is winding his arms tightly around Jesse's waist, hitching him close. "Walt," he amends, sheepish, as his pleasure ebbs.

Walt doesn't comment, catching Jesse's mouth in a bruising kiss, stroking Jesse's forearms as Jesse makes enough space between them to wrap both hands around Walt's erection. Walt comes gasping.

They rest like that for a while, with Jesse's head tucked into the crook of Walt's neck, not even bothering to clean up. There are about a thousand practical things they should be doing, and Jesse's feet are starting to cramp because he's got his toes jammed into the mattress. Walt kisses down the line of Jesse's jaw, seeking his lips again. Jesse lifts his head, nuzzling into the contact with a sigh.

"I'm so tired I can't remember what my name is supposed to be," he mumbles, drowsily content.

"You're Jesse Pinkman," murmurs Walt, like it's some kind of heretic prayer, "and I'm yours, too."