SPN J2 AU fic: Green Means Go (3/4)

[electricalgwen]

Masterpost

Part Three

Jared has been trying to explain Chad to Jensen. Chad is difficult to explain.

“So why’d he quit your little club?”

Jared laughs. “Chad and Jeff, man, they… God, they were never gonna work out. Jeff’s all about order and discipline, and Chad fucking hates being told what to do. He used to be our main IT and tech guy, and he’d pull the stupidest shit just to piss off Jeff.”

He stretches, hearing his shoulder crack. Old age, if he makes it there, is gonna suck, what with all the crap he puts his body through.

“The last prank he pulled there, he replaced Jeff’s electronic signature file with the Miss October centerfold. Jeff sent emails to at least three major government officials before he noticed. Katie and I had a bet on whether Chad would actually survive.”

“Who won?” Jensen inquires.

“I did, of course.” Jared’s lips quirk. “Actually, I only bet in his favor because friends gotta stick by each other. I thought Jeff was going to drop him off a tall building.”

“I’m getting less enthused about your plan to trust our lives to this guy.”

“No way, man,” Jared says, “he’s cool. And he likes you.”

“He doesn’t know me.”

Jared winces. “Right. I mean, the old you. He liked you. Back then.”

There’s a pause, and Jensen raises an eyebrow. “Liked me?”

Jared gapes a moment, then bursts out laughing again. “God, no. Chad is all about the ladies.”

He sobers, looks at Jensen, looks back down at his hands.

“So that. Would… You okay with that?”

“What?”

“A guy. Uh. Liking other guys.”

Jensen shrugs. “I guess. Whatever. Don’t get why everyone makes such a fuss.”

There’s something a little off in the way he says it, some tension hinted at in the stillness of his hands and the line at the corner of his mouth.

“Yeah,” Jared says, and doesn’t pursue it. “Found anything edible yet?”

Jensen grins and brandishes a box of cereal.

“I bow to your foraging skills,” Jared says, and spends the next ten minutes catching brown sugar Mini Wheats in his mouth. Jensen lobs them ever higher, silhouetted against the sunset burning up the horizon, and Jared laughs and kicks out at him and tries to brand every single detail into his mind because memory is fragile but sometimes that’s all you get.

Jensen doesn’t remember falling asleep again, but he wakes up to Jared shaking his shoulder. The truck is pulling into a loading zone behind a large warehouse. He’s glad for his Salvation Army jacket after all; it had gotten cool once the sun went down.

“They might not unload till morning,” Jared whispers, “but it’s an open truck, I wouldn’t count on it. Let’s go.”

Jensen turns for the back of the truck but Jared tugs his elbow, shaking his head and gesturing forward. Jensen’s puzzled a moment until the truck comes to a halt and starts reversing, rear end heading for the brightly lit loading dock. They rapidly make their way up front just behind the passenger side of the cab, staying out of sight behind a single layer of crates, and climb the side slats. When the truck stops, it’s the work of a moment to swing over the side and down to the ground, and move away into the shadows.

The next street over, there’s a late-night pizza place, a tattoo parlor, and a bar.

“You look too good for this neighborhood,” Jared says critically, as they turn the corner. He takes off the ball cap and shoves it crookedly on Jensen’s head.

“Ugh, cooties,” Jensen says. Jared elbows him.

“Go order us some pizza,” he says, and hands Jensen a twenty. “I’m’a call Chad, get him to pick us up.”

“I thought you couldn’t turn on your phone?” Jensen says.

“That’s why I’m going to the bar,” Jared says, and winks at him.

The pizza smells incredible, although Jensen has serious doubts about the kitchen’s adherence to the Food Handling Safety Code. He’s hungry enough that he doesn’t care; he’s already eaten most of his first slice before Jared slides into the booth.

“You get Chad?” Jensen says.

“Yup,” Jared says with a shit-eating grin, “and the bartender’s number.” He tosses it to Jensen. “Here, you can have it.”

“Thanks, man,” Jensen says dryly. “Nice to know you’re looking out for me.”

“Eat up,” Jared says, “we got ten minutes.”

Nine minutes and forty-five seconds later, the most ridiculous car Jensen has ever seen slides up to the curb outside. Jared grabs the last slice of pizza, rolls it up and stuffs the end in his mouth. “Mmph.”

“I can tell he made a great secret agent,” Jensen mutters, as they walk out to the cherry-red, pimped-out monster.

“People remember the car, not the person,” Jared says mildly, and leans in the open passenger side window. “Hey Chad. You’re a life saver.”

“No shit,” says the scruffy blond behind the wheel. “Get in, you morons. Cops’ll be here soon.”

“I’m surprised they don’t automatically trail you the minute you leave home,” Jensen says, sliding into the back.

“Pleasant as ever, Ackles,” Chad says. “Least I don’t drive a pussy piece of shit like your Prius.”

“That’s Danni’s car!” Jensen blanches. “Shit. Tell me I didn’t own a Prius? I mean, before?”

“Quit taunting the guy with no memory,” Jared says, smacking Chad across the back of the head. “Don’t worry, Jensen. You had a perfectly manly truck.”

“Manly?” Chad snorts. “It ran on fucking biofuel.”

“Ecologically friendly isn’t unmanly,” Jared says. “It just means he wasn’t a selfish asshole.”

Chad opens his mouth to say something, but Jared promptly shoves the last of the pizza in Chad’s mouth, effectively suffocating his reply.

Jensen leans back, stretches his arms along the back of the seat, and listens to the sound of Jared’s voice, more than the actual words, as he fills Chad in on the past – ten hours. Holy shit. Has he really only known Jared under half a day? It feels longer.

It’s not surprising, maybe, that Jared feels familiar. They apparently knew each other, they worked together, and even if Jensen doesn’t remember being friends with Jared, clearly his subconscious is comfortable with it.

This doesn’t really explain why his subconscious is comfortable with Jared spooning him and kind of wishes it would happen again, but Jensen isn’t up to thinking about that right now, even if his subconscious were the cooperative type. He lets himself drift, listening to Jared and feeling startlingly content.

Chad waves them into his one bedroom apartment.

“You two lovebirds can have the sofa bed.”

Jensen raises his eyebrows and hangs his jacket on the back of a chair. “No problem. Long as Sasquatch doesn’t steal all the blankets.”

“Jensen, can you excuse us a moment?” Jared says, fixed smile in place, and herds Chad into the kitchenette. Jensen blinks as the door closes firmly behind them

“…doesn’t know…”

“…just pathetic, man.”

“You can’t…”

“…not giving up my…”

“…don’t have to – Chad, please just… don’t, okay?”

The kitchen door swings open. Jared comes out, gives Jensen a horribly strained smile, and heads down the hall to what is presumably the bathroom.

Chad looks at Jensen. Jensen looks at Chad.

“You be nice to my boy,” Chad says finally, “he’s been through a lot of shit the last few years. And he’s really gone and stuck his neck out for you now. So don’t fuck up.”

“Thanks for putting us up,” Jensen says. “I appreciate it.”

“Whatever, Ackles,” Chad says. “I never liked you.”

“I suspect it was mutual,” Jensen says.

“You really don’t remember anything?” Chad says.

“I really don’t,” Jensen says.

Chad nods like he’s gonna say something else, but Jared comes back down the hall and the moment’s gone.

“Sleep well,” Chad says. Jensen doesn’t miss the mocking note in his voice or the way Jared flinches, but he doesn’t know what to make of it, so he busies himself pulling out the sofa bed.

Jared takes off his jacket and T-shirt, starts unbuttoning his jeans, and hesitates.

“Sorry about Chad,” he says, “but it’s the best I could do.”

Jensen shrugs, pulling off his own clothes. “Hey, it’s your show. You’re doing pretty good so far.”

He rolls himself up in a blanket and flops down onto the mattress. It’s lumpy and sags in the middle and he’s out before he knows it. He’s only vaguely aware of Jared turning out the lights, and the dip in the bed as Jared’s weight joins his.

He wakes up snuggled up to Jared once again, but at least this time he can blame the bed.

Chad’s idea of breakfast is cereal that’s mostly sugar and day-glo colors. Jared eats three bowlfuls. Jensen makes do with coffee.

“So what now?” Chad says. “You can’t have my car.”

“Airport,” Jared says. “But it’ll be watched.”

“Really?” Jensen asks. “You think they followed us?”

Jared shrugs. “Not directly. But they didn’t catch us going through the San Antonio airport, and they’ll have been searching the city. Jeff’ll have picked up the SUV already. We might have got past them at the airport, or holed up in town somewhere, but if I were in their place? I’d assume the target left by road. It’s pretty easy to work out the radius, places we could be in by now. It’ll be harder for them to cover all the possible ground. But let’s face it, this is an obvious spot to scope out.”

He pours himself some more cereal. “Plus, we got more to worry about than Jeff’s crew.” His voice drops apologetically. “I can’t figure out what the Republic wants you for, or why they’d get Jeff to go after you after Danni put all that time in with you. But we’ve probably got the Republic on our tail as well.”

“So, odds are good someone’s in that airport,” Jensen says.

“Yeah,” Jared admits. “But we’ve still got a lot of ground to cover, and air’s the best way to go.” He turns to Chad. “Can you get us in?”

Chad looks affronted. “Of course I can. Just ‘cause I don’t work for the man, doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten everything.”

Jared winces and glances at Jensen.

“Yeah, yeah,” Chad says. “He’s not made of glass, you know.”

He stands and heads for the door. “Give me half an hour. I’ll borrow Sophia’s car. If you need to make any calls, there’s a link in my bedroom and it’s permanently scrambled.”

“Your brain is permanently scrambled,” Jared says, but he’s smiling.

Jensen finds himself smiling too.

Chad does in fact turn out to be surprisingly good at this sort of thing.

He parks Sophia’s boring, indeterminate car outside the airport fence, disables a small section, and cuts through it in under three minutes. There’s a baggage cart on the far side.

“Here you go,” he says, passing Jensen an official-looking hat. “Good luck.”

“Thanks,” Jensen says awkwardly.

“I owe you one,” Jared says, ducking under a tarp on the back of the cart.

“No shit,” Chad says. “Don’t get caught.”

At first, Jensen tries not to drive too fast, afraid of attracting attention. He soon figures out that in fact, driving his usual reckless speed is the best way to blend in.

“That one,” Jared hisses, “to the left. That’s the gate for Phoenix. It leaves in ten minutes.”

They’re in luck. Most of the baggage carts are already unloaded, their handlers driving away. Jensen pulls up on the far side. They wait until a shuttle bus passes by, then dash over beneath the plane.

The cargo hatch uses the standard maglock. It only takes Jared three seconds to disable it.

“You have a sonic screwdriver?” Jensen says incredulously.

Jared laughs. “Nah. It’s a combination RFID jammer and mini EM pulse generator. Something Gen cooked up. But man, she’s gonna love it that you called it that.”

There’s a splutter, a whir, and the engines roar to life.

“Jesus fuck!” Jared yells. “Since when do planes leave ahead of schedule?”

He cups his hands and motions to Jensen, who catches on fast and sets his foot in them. Jared hoists Jensen up on his shoulders, and Jensen shoves hard against the hatch, sliding it open enough that they can get in.

The engine noise is deafening. Jensen calls something down to him but Jared can’t make out the words.

Jensen catches the edge of the cargo bay. He pulls himself up slightly, getting his elbows on the side of the hatch. Jared can feel him tense, preparing to swing up, when the plane starts to move.

Jensen flails, lower body swinging free, and his foot catches Jared on the shoulder, knocking him back. Jared keeps his balance and staggers forward again, reaching up to try and help Jensen, but the plane is moving back fast, reversing away from the gate.

Jensen swings himself fully into the cargo bay, turns and leans out. He’s lying flat, one hand gripping the hatch, one extended to Jared.

The plane slows to a halt. The wheels rotate as it prepares to turn and taxi forward out on to the runway. Jared reaches up, open hand locking around Jensen’s wrist.

“I’m heavier than you!” he shouts, against the engines and the wind.

“My feet are anchored!” Jensen yells back. “Can you jump?”

The plane begins to move. Jared starts running, gauges speed and elevation, and leaps, letting Jensen pull him up as well. His free hand grabs the edge of the hatch.

The ground is dropping away from beneath his feet as the aircraft starts to rise.

There’s a flicker in the corner of his vision. He turns his head slightly, just in time to have the box sliding past Jensen fall through the hatch and hit him between the eyes.

It knocks him sideways. His hands are torn free. He hears a cry. He thinks it’s him, but then he hits the landing gear, hard. The breath is knocked out of him, but he can still hear frantic yelling. It must be Jensen. God. He hopes Jensen doesn’t do anything stupid.

He’s sliding, falling again, and he grabs on with both hands, grips the metal strut as hard as he can. His stomach muscles scream at him as he tries to keep his legs up, away from the still-spinning wheel. He wants to call out to Jensen, tell him he’s okay, tell him to shut the hatch, but he can’t seem to marshal the breath.

He pulls himself up, hand over hand, and gets his feet onto the struts. Just in time: there’s a squeal of metal and loud whirring noise as the landing gear starts to retract. Jared scrambles around the folding struts, yanks his left foot up just in time to avoid it being crushed.

He can’t hear anything anymore, over the rushing air, engines and motors and gears. He looks to where Jensen is, framed wide-eyed and horrified in the hatch, and risks letting go with one hand to give the universal signal for ‘okay’. He wishes there were a universal signal for ‘quit worrying about me and close the fucking hatch before you fall out’.

He hopes Jensen saw him, but there’s no time for anything more. The wheels fold up past the edge of metal and the panels swing into place beneath him.

“See you on the other side,” he mutters. He’s glad he called ahead to Jim. There will be someone to watch out for Jensen, if he doesn’t make it.

He still has his rope. It’s hard work to get it out from beneath his shirt, in the confined space, and the temperature is dropping fast already, but he pulls out enough to lash around the struts. He leaves the rest looped around his waist, tied securely but not too tightly. This isn’t a long flight, they won’t be going too high, but it’s still very easy to get disoriented or weakened at altitude.

Stowing away on landing gear is tricky business. If you don’t freeze, or die from oxygen deprivation, you risk being fried by the heat of the engines. You can fall to your death when you black-out at high altitudes, or when the landing gear deploys with no warning. Odds of survival are maybe twenty percent at best.

Jared reflects that’s actually better odds than various other stupid things he’s done, and settles in to enjoy the flight. At least there won’t be any stupid, stale rice snacks.

Jensen spends the flight alternately worrying about and cursing Jared. The cargo hold gets bone-chillingly cold, but he knows it’s nothing like what Jared must be experiencing.

After maybe a quarter of an hour, he opens a couple of suitcases and rifles through them. He finds a nice knitted sweater and windproof jacket in his size and puts them on.

It takes him most of the rest of the flight to find something that might have a hope of fitting Jared. He pulls it over his own stolen layers, and refuses to think about the possibility that Jared might not be around to make use of it. The sickening lurch in his stomach when the landing gear deploys isn’t due to the plane’s movement, though.

Two days ago he didn’t know Jared existed. Now, he feels like throwing up at the idea that Jared might stop existing.

He breathes in through his nose, out through his mouth, thinks about blue sky and warm sun and Jared’s wide smile, and mentally rehearses what he’s going to do when the plane stops.

Jared comes to slowly. There’s a lot of noise, and his hands hurt.

Someone is yelling in his ear. He’s cold.

“Jared! Jared, can you hear me? Wake up. We have to get out of here!”

It’s Jensen. Jensen is untying the rope.

Jared wiggles his feet experimentally. They’re still attached.

Jensen pulls at his shoulders and Jared falls.

“Shit!” he hears Jensen say from somewhere underneath him.

He staggers to his feet. At least, he thinks he does. His feet are still uncertain as to where they are, but his head seems to be at its usual height, so he’s probably standing.

“Here.” Jared’s arm is being looped over Jensen’s shoulder. “You have to move, Jared, fast as you can, it’s not far, okay? Just trust me.”

Jared does. He puts one foot in front of the other. There’s wire in front of him. Then there isn’t. He falls through. There’s a truck.

It’s warm in the back, but Jared’s so cold. There are blankets, but they aren’t enough.

“He’s not shivering,” Jensen’s voice says, and another voice answers, gruff and worried.

Then there’s warmth next to him, arms around him, and he lets himself sleep because he knows he’s safe.

When Jared wakes up again, his head is considerably clearer. He’s rolled up in blankets and lying on an ancient sofa next to a woodstove that is putting out ridiculous amounts of heat, especially considering it’s June in Phoenix.

He sits up and realizes he’s naked under the blankets.

“Skin to skin works best,” Jensen says apologetically from behind him. “You feeling okay?”

Jared’s not sure he trusts himself to answer. Apparently he was naked, with Jensen, and it’s his turn to not remember anything. Great.

“Air’s the best way to go, huh?” Jensen says acerbically. “Don’t you ever fucking scare me like that again.”

Jared doesn’t trust his voice, just leaps up and scoops him into a full-body hug. One that perhaps goes on a little too long, because Jensen has to catch his breath when Jared finally lets him go.

“Clothes,” Jensen says hoarsely, and waves at the coffee table before fleeing the room.

Jared pulls on the sweatpants and T-shirt lying there and follows him. He finds Jensen and Jim both in Jim’s study. Jensen is nose deep in a mug of coffee. There’s a plate of toast next to him, balanced precariously on one of the many stacks of books littering the floor.

“You’re late,” says Jim, “the coffee’s all gone.”

“Your coffee’s awful anyway,” Jared says, “only an addict like Jensen would drink it.”

“How…” Jensen starts, and then desists. “Right.”

“Thanks, Jim,” Jared says simply. “I owe you.”

“Trust you to screw up something that simple,” Jim says. “You didn’t say you were planning to travel outside the plane.”

“I didn’t expect to,” Jared says.

“Place was busy,” Jim says. “Republic was there, and some others I didn’t recognize. Jensen did well, though.”

Jared smiles. “Told you.”

Jim snorts. “You were lucky. They were mostly paying attention to another plane came in right before you, had some Greens on it. Don’t think you’re likely to get out that way again.”

“So we drive,” Jared says.

“Nope,” Jim says. “Security’s been all over that too.”

“So what do you suggest?” Jensen says. “I’m not walking all the way to California.”

“Boat.”

“What?” Jared says incredulously.

Jim reaches for one of the many books stacked on the table. There’s a faded yellow bookmark in it; he flips it open and traces a finger across the map. “The Gila’s pretty much the straightest route there is to Cali. Dumps into the Colorado River at Yuma. Get out the far side of the river, you’re on Free State soil.”

Jared frowns. “I didn’t think that stretch of the river was navigable.”

“Wasn’t,” Jim says. “She used to be pretty much dry from Phoenix on down, except in rainy season. Most of the water got diverted to irrigation projects, and ‘course there was the dam up at Granite Reef took all the rest into Phoenix.”

“Ah,” Jared says, understanding dawning. “So when the Greens took out the dam…”

“…river started gettin’ back to its old self,” Jim agrees. “She’s never gonna be a shipping route, but she’s deep and wide enough. You can run a boat straight through to the California border.”

“Doesn’t anyone watch it?” Jensen asks.

Jim shrugs. “Not real hard. A lot of the irrigation infrastructure round the dam was destroyed, and there’s not enough water to run the rest of it. Most of that land’s gone back to desert. Nobody out there, nobody much bothers with it.” He taps his finger on Yuma. “You’ll likely have some trouble at the border itself, but the way there should be pretty clear – if you keep your heads down.”

This last is accompanied by a glare aimed in Jared’s direction. Jensen looks questioningly at Jared. Jared smirks.

“Always do, Jim.”

Jim grunts, raises his eyebrows, and heads for the kitchen. Anything he mutters is mostly lost in the noise of water running into the kettle, but Jared’s pretty sure the word “idiot” is in there somewhere.

Jensen lets out a long breath. “Jared. I…” He trails off, flicking a finger against his coffee mug and staring at the floor.

Jared leans forward, immediately concerned. “Hey. You okay?”

Jensen’s eyes snap up. “Me? I’m fine. What about you?” He gestures. “You nearly died back there.”

“I nearly die all the time,” Jared says, laughing. “I’m real good at the ‘nearly’ part.” He holds Jensen’s gaze, telegraphing reassurance. “Seriously, man, it’s no big deal. I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“Chad was right,” Jensen says softly. “You wouldn’t be out here, running, if it weren’t for me. I still don’t know what the fuck it’s all about. And I’m never going to be able to repay you. Just…thanks.”

Jared shakes his head; Jensen doesn’t get it.

“You saved my life just now. And there’s nothing…” he stops. It’s not the time to tell Jensen. It may never be the time.

“There’s nothing to repay me for,” he says instead. “Whatever’s happening, we’ll figure it out. We’ve still got friends.”

“Yeah,” Jensen says. “At least, you do.” He leans back in Jim’s ancient, dusty armchair and closes his eyes, but stress and pain are still evident in every line of his body. Jared’s heart twists.

“I’m sorry about Danneel,” he offers.

Jensen nods, eyes still shut, and his jaw clenches. But then he relaxes, and the tension seems to flow out of his whole body. By the time Jared picks himself up and wanders into the kitchen in search of the new batch of coffee, Jensen’s asleep. Occasional faint twitches of his limbs kick up dust motes, golden in the sunlight streaming in.

They pay for passage on a refitted ex-Navy gunboat, in the back room of a bar Jim knows. Jared doesn’t like heading in to town but he figures a dubious bar after dark is as safe as it gets, and there’s been no sign yet anyone tracked them out of Albuquerque. He also doesn’t like taking Jensen there with him, but he can understand the captain’s refusal to take on any passengers he hasn’t met. And he really doesn’t like the idea of leaving Jensen somewhere without him.

He does indeed keep his head down; he wears a hooded sweatshirt, and slouches as much as possible. He makes Jensen do the same. Jensen bitches like mad. Jared laughs at him later, back at Jim’s, when Jensen snuggles down in the hoodie and won’t take it off. Jensen flips him off, looking owlish and adorable.

Every once in a while, Jared will catch Jensen watching him. It’s subtle – Jensen always was good at surveillance – but it’s there, and Jared can’t quite get a read on it. Sometimes, it almost feels like the old Jensen never left. Like they could maybe be the way they were.

But Jared doesn’t trust himself enough to believe that can lead anywhere but disaster. He’s too likely to see what he wants to see. Jensen’s been through a hell of a lot in the last couple of days; he’s lost his home, his girlfriend, his new identity. It’s not surprising that Jensen would study him: right now, Jared’s all Jensen’s got, and given the circumstances under which they met and have been traveling, it’s completely logical that Jensen wouldn’t entirely trust him.

Except distrust is not the vibe he’s getting from Jensen. At all.

But then, Jared’s never been able to think all that logically where Jensen was concerned.

Jensen’s watching him again now, as Jared paces back and forth in the tiny confines of their cabin. It’s not a large boat, but there’s room enough for smuggling various goods as well as passengers, and it’s impressive enough that pirates aren’t likely to tangle with it. She makes eighteen to twenty knots an hour, which Jared figures should get them to Yuma somewhere around three a.m., given that they left just after sunset.

“They’ll let us off a mile or so from the border,” Jared had told Jim, “out of sight of the bridge tower guards. We’ll have a couple of hours to hike down to the Colorado and get across while it’s still dark.”

Jim had just grunted and waved them towards a particular cupboard, from which Jared had added various climbing and grappling supplies to the growing piles of stuff in front of them – all of which was now wrapped around them, tucked in boots, or secured in small, waterproof belt packs.

“Cut that out,” Jensen says, waving at Jared’s feet. “You’re making me claustrophobic.”

Jared halts mid-stride, and sits, back against the wall and legs sprawled out.

“You should nap,” Jensen says.

Jared snorts. “Not here.”

“I can watch.”

Jared shakes his head. “I got enough sleep at Jim’s this afternoon.”

Jensen frowns.

“It’s not…” Jared says. “I trust you. Honestly. I just…I couldn’t right now.”

“Okay then,” Jensen says after a long stare, digging through a pocket and extracting a package of band-aids and a deck of cards. “Poker?”

They play for a couple of hours, by which time Jared’s theoretically down around five hundred bucks in band-aid equivalents. It’s past one already. Their cabin’s hot and he’s inexplicably jittery.

“Let’s go above,” he says, and Jensen’s right behind him.

The river’s running through empty territory. The stars are brilliant. Times like this, Jared sympathizes more with the Greens. He takes deep breaths of cool night air, finds the familiar constellations, and sneaks peeks at Jensen’s profile silvered in the moonlight.

They’re standing at the stern, watching the wake slide past, when instinct alerts him someone’s nearby.

He looks to the side, keeping his head as straight as possible. A head rises out of a hatch. The moonlight catches the person’s face briefly as they climb out and melt into the shadows heading for the bow. Seconds later, there’s an almost imperceptible splash.

Jared knows that face. Shit. They were followed. This is bad. He grabs Jensen’s elbow and tugs him away from the edge of the boat, ducking and pulling him down out of sight just as the tiny, silent podcraft passes the stern and disappears upriver into the dark.

“We have to get off this boat,” Jared says quietly in Jensen’s ear. He expects some questioning, at least a dubious look or the familiar raised eyebrow, but Jensen just nods and follows him below.

They’d passed a diving locker on the way to the deck. Jared heads for it.

The locker door sticks. It’s been dented many times, probably by people knocking into it with scuba tanks. Jared gives it a vicious push. It resists, then abruptly releases; he stumbles back and smacks into Jensen.

“Sorry,” he says, “I – ” and then breaks off, willing down memories. Jensen’s hands have come up to grip his shoulders; Jensen’s front is pressed against his back. “I’m okay,” Jared says quietly, gently shaking Jensen off and stepping forward. “We just need to get some gear.”

Jensen silently holds the door wide to let the dim light in. Jared is dismayed by the locker’s relative emptiness. “Fuck.” He digs through the tarps, ropes, and various bits of equipment on the floor but there’s clearly only one set of scuba gear here. At least it’s ready to go; the tank pressure gauge reads full, and he offers silent thanks that the neoprene vest it’s strapped to is Jared-sized.

“Goddamnit,” he says, slinging it on. “Upstairs, upstairs, there’s probably another set by the boats…” He grabs Jensen’s arm and hauls him down the dark, narrow hallway to a ladder, other hand fumbling with the vest buckles. The primary breather is tethered securely but the secondary has come unclipped and tangles around an ankle as he scrambles up the steep ladder. He stumbles and nearly falls as he emerges on deck, but Jensen’s right behind him and steadies him yet again.

“Sorry, sorry,” he mutters again. Fuck, he has got to get this under control; he’s going to get them killed if he doesn’t. Things aren’t the way they were, and they’re not going to be. This isn’t the old Jensen, and he can’t rely on his instincts, can’t act as if they’re the unstoppable pair they used to be. Not that Jensen’s subconscious isn’t pretty fucking good – he’d be dead already, otherwise – but this new Jensen isn’t the same person and Jared has to remember that.

Has to remember that, and forget a hell of a lot else.

They’re crouched by one of the boats, its shadow a darker inky patch in the night. A bench runs along the edge here, its thinly cushioned seat covering yet more storage. Jared eases the lid up quietly, willing it not to squeak, and reaches one long arm in to fumble around. He’s met with a dismaying amount of space. No tanks, no life vest, nothing. He slides along a bit, reaches farther. Still nothing.

He looks along the deck. There’s a patch of moonlight between them and the next set of boats, but the place seems deserted, nobody else on deck, and the tingle at the base of his skull that usually tells him when he’s being watched is quiet. It makes sense, given who he saw and what he’s expecting; there’s unlikely to be any Republic agents left on board. Still, he didn’t survive this long without being careful.

He turns to Jensen, who’s kept one hand loosely against Jared’s ankle. A fierce, proud shock races through him as he sees that Jensen has his head down, eyes and mouth closed, no glint of teeth or eyes to give them away. Memory or instinct, Jared can’t know, but Jensen is doing his best to keep them safe and trusting Jared to keep him safe, and that – that’s, huh, actually kind of amazing.

He moves his mouth to Jensen’s ear. “Nothing here, gonna move to the next set,” he breathes, and Jensen nods, opens his eyes but keeps looking down. Jared takes another look around, listens for movement, whispers, footsteps, anything to indicate they aren’t alone up here.

Nothing alarming. He starts to stand, still listening, and there it is, a faint change in the engine, a shudder, and fuck it they are out of time. He reaches out, grabs Jensen by both shoulders, throws himself backwards, at the rail and over, and they are falling, falling, Jared still trying to push against the air, get as far as possible. They hit the water a fraction of a second before the boat blows up.

Jared wraps his arms around Jensen and kicks out hard, swimming down and away. A chunk of metal tears past his right elbow. Splashes and light all around them mark where pieces of burning wreckage are falling; he ignores it all, concentrating on putting as much distance as he can between them and the wreck.

His lungs are burning and he can’t see. Jensen has locked his arms around Jared’s back too; Jared releases his own grip on Jensen, squeezing gently before he does so to signal reassurance, and unclips the primary breather. Tucking it in his mouth, he takes a deep breath, and another. They’ll be trailing bubbles, but he hopes it won’t be noticeable in the dark and the disaster above them.

The mask is still hanging around his neck. They’re still swimming blind, but getting Jensen air is the priority. He sweeps an arm behind him and around his head, locating and bringing up the secondary breather. Holding it in his right hand, he slides his left up Jensen’s shoulder, neck and chin and taps his fingers over Jensen’s closed lips. He brings the secondary to Jensen’s mouth and Jensen seals around it. Jared lets go and starts pulling the mask on, tipping his head up and exhaling into it through his nose to clear the water out.

Ten seconds later, Jensen’s tugging frantically at him. Jared opens his eyes in alarm. He still can’t see much, it’s far too dark despite the glow behind them, but Jensen looks panicked and there is no stream of bubbles to match his own.

Jared grabs the primary from his own mouth, tugs the other out of Jensen’s mouth and swaps them. Jensen’s chest heaves against his as he sucks in air. Jared tries and gets nothing. He tries again, adjusts the mouthpiece, yanks on the tubing, but there’s no airflow. The system or the tube must be damaged; maybe that’s why this set was left behind in the first place.

He’s starting to feel the need to breathe again. They’re moving fast. He realizes they’ve fallen into a rhythm, muscles working hard and efficiently, synchronously, getting maximum pull through the water without kicking each other. Jensen’s keeping hold of him with one arm now, using the other to help propel them along. His eyes are closed. Jared feels that same brief shock that Jensen gets it, that Jensen trusts him.

He moves his hand once again to Jensen’s face, to his mouth, and Jensen opens, releases the breather, no hesitation. Jared can’t read his expression in the gloom but he knows, bone-deep, there’s no fear, nothing but concentration.

He remembers that look.

A few breaths later, he places the breather back in Jensen’s mouth. They keep going like that, adjusting position slightly to be more comfortable, swimming side by side. Jensen keeps one hand clenched on Jared’s vest; Jared uses one hand to swap the breather back and forth; their free arms pull through the water in perfect rhythm. Jared navigates as best he can, heading away, trying to keep a safe depth and guessing at their distance from shore. Once, when Jensen’s got the breather safely clenched between his teeth, Jared tries to read the pressure gauge but he can’t make out anything in the darkness and there’s no light clipped to the vest. He’s got a small flashlight of his own in one pocket, but it’s useless and waterlogged at this point.

As a result, there’s little warning when the air runs out. He thinks the flow feels less on his last breath, passes the mouthpiece to Jensen, and a few seconds later Jensen’s hand on his vest squeezes twice. Jensen turns his face to Jared, gesturing at his mouth.

They’ve been down at least twenty minutes, Jared estimates, and swimming fast in the direction of the current. The boat, together with any survivors, rescuers, and those aiming to make sure the wrong people weren’t rescued, will be drifting with the current too, but they’re probably clear by now. Besides, they don’t really have a choice.

He clasps Jensen’s free hand in his and raises it above his head. Jensen understands immediately and moves with him, face upturned and trailing a slow stream of exhaled bubbles, last of the air, as they swim towards the surface.

They break the surface and look back, heads turning as one. Copters are circling the distant wreck but it’s far behind them. They’re in the center of the river, maybe twenty feet from land and in the middle of nowhere; no lights break the dark line of the shore.

The night air tastes cold and clean in Jared’s mouth, after the stale, rubbery air from the scuba set. It feels luxurious to take a breath whenever he wants.

They get to shore and scramble up the bank. Jared gestures inland and Jensen nods, falling in behind him. He doesn’t want to leave the scuba tank here for someone to find, and they’re both in wet, constricting clothing, but they still move at a decent pace until they’re out of sight of the river.

He peels back his sodden sleeve as they hike and checks his watch. It’s two-thirty now. If the boat blew somewhere between one-thirty and two a.m., that puts them at least twenty-five miles upstream from Yuma. There’s no way they can make it overland before dawn.

“We’re going to need to hole up somewhere,” he says. “For the day. I don’t think we can afford to travel during daylight. We’re too visible, plus it’s going to get really fucking hot out here.”

“There,” Jensen says, pointing.

Jared nods and makes for the low hill. The whole area is strewn with large rocks tumbled haphazardly together, and there’s an overhang on one side of the hill under which they won’t be easily seen.

He ducks in under it, starts struggling out of the scuba vest, and accidentally hits his head on rock as he straightens up. “Ow.”

“Idiot,” Jensen says, but gently pushes him back out into the open and helps him get the tank off. They shove it deep into a crevice, where the metal won’t catch sunlight, and slide back into their makeshift shelter.

“We should get out of these wet clothes,” Jared says.

They strip down to underwear. The rocks around them hold only the faintest trace of the heat from the previous day, but Jared figures that as soon as the sun comes up, their stuff should dry pretty quickly.

Jared watches Jensen as they move around each other, sneaking peeks at the clean lines of his well-muscled body. It’s less tanned than Jared remembers, but there are some distracting freckles splashed across his shoulders. When Jensen stops moving and just stands there, Jared suddenly realizes he’s staring and raises his eyes with a start to find Jensen looking at him with an unreadable expression.

“Uh,” Jared says. “You hungry?”

He opens one of the waist packs and is relieved to find it was as waterproof as advertised; his gun is still dry. So are the bandages and, more importantly, the emergency rations. He tosses Jensen a protein bar and wolfs one down himself.

Jensen’s settled down on the least rocky bit of their shelter, tucked in where the side of the hill rises up to form the back wall. He’s huddled into a ball, knees pulled up against his chest, shivering slightly.

“Hey,” Jared says, sitting down beside him. Jensen startles briefly, but doesn’t pull away.

“I hear skin to skin works best for keeping warm,” Jared says, lightly. He doesn’t want to scare Jensen off, but he is honestly worried. There are still a few cold hours to get through.

Jensen doesn’t say anything. Jared inwardly kicks himself and starts to move away, but Jensen’s hand grips his arm and pulls him back down. Jensen’s fingers interlace with his, pulling Jared’s arm around Jensen’s chest, and Jensen leans back into him. He still doesn’t say anything, just looks out at the stars.

The warmth that spreads through Jared is out of all proportion to their shared body heat. Jensen is still awake and allowing Jared to snuggle him.

Jared meant to keep watch – pursuit is unlikely but not impossible, and humans are not the only danger out here – but fatigue is sinking deeply into him and his vision is blurring, the stars seeming to trail across the sky. Jensen’s breathing is slow and even against him. He matches it, and his eyes drift shut.

Jared wakes up with Jensen moaning and thrashing next to him. His eyes are wide open but glazed over. Nightmare.

He smoothes a hand over Jensen’s hair, talks to him, until awareness returns.

“Bad?” he says.

Jensen’s hands are shaking. He clenches them into fists.

“Jared,” he says, “I remember something. I remember. The night I disappeared.”

Jared stays quiet.

“The boat, the explosion.” Jensen rubs his hands up and down his arms, where goosebumps are rising. Jared doesn’t think it’s from the cold, but he moves in behind Jensen, gathers him in close and starts running his own hands along Jensen’s back and shoulders. The muscles are rigid under his palms.

“It was…” Jensen’s breath hitches, “it was like before. There was an explosion. No warning. I should have – ”

He slams a hand against the ground. “I couldn’t get to him.”

Jared keeps rubbing Jensen’s shoulders and neck and just listens.

“There was a scientist,” Jensen says, so quietly Jared can barely hear him. Jared isn’t particularly surprised; there’s always a scientist. “He worked out a new method for storing solar energy.”

Jared raises an eyebrow. This doesn’t sound like something the Ghosts would kill for – and if Jensen had been involved, odds were killing was at least a possibility. He says as much.

Jensen shakes his head. “No, dude. You don’t get it. This…thing,” he holds his hands barely six inches apart, shapes a cube, “it concentrated it. Soaked it up, held it, spat it out as electricity, practically no heat loss or decay. It was safe, efficient, and cheap to make. One of those things’d power your whole damn house for a week – and they’d recharge themselves in just a couple of days. Maybe a week if the weather was really shitty.”

Jared is starting to get a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“Buy two or three of ‘em and that’d be it,” Jensen says. “You could leave the grid for good. Get yourself another for your electric car, and…”

“And StarOil’s out of business,” Jared says numbly. “So they…”

There’s a roaring in Jared’s ears; his tongue is having trouble shaping the words forming in his brain. His nails dig into his palm.

Jensen’s hand covers his, slowly tugs, unfurls his fingers. Jared stares at the red crescent marks; Jensen soothes over them with his thumb.

“Yeah,” Jensen says. “They did.”

He goes on talking, explains how they blew the lab all to hell: the prototype, the computers, all Zach’s notes, Zach himself.

“He was pretty much the only one who understood it.” Jensen rubs the back of his neck. “I mean, he was just this oddball scientist working on some underfunded project nobody really thinks is gonna pan out. He had a government grant so he had to file progress reports once a year, and his last one – I dunno, nobody seemed to get too excited about it, still sounded like a pipedream. But Jeff had a hunch. You know how he gets.”

Jared nods. His whole moderately successful career to date has been based on Jeff’s hunches.

“Jeff thought the guy was worth keeping an eye on.” Jensen laughs bitterly. “And fuck, he was right. Zach was a genius.”

Jared opens his mouth to ask how StarOil found out, but the answer is obvious. They’re all over the government. Maybe nobody got publicly excited about the project’s progress, but somebody besides Jeff would have been watching.

“Cali was watching too,” Jensen says. “The Greens knew this guy was close to having the real thing. I don’t know if they knew he’d actually done it. Their guy was a total nutjob, even more than usual for them, but he was good. I could never figure out if he was constantly stoned or, I dunno, some super-functioning autistic type, but if anyone besides me knew that there was a functional prototype, he would have. The minute I knew, I started working out how to get Zach to Jeff without Misha trailing us.”

“Misha?” Jared frowns. “I don’t know him.” Which means either he died in the blast too, or he hasn’t been active in Texas since. Jared can’t imagine there’s a Cali agent in Texas that he hasn’t at some point encountered, spied on, or dealt with. Or dug up.

“Alona,” he says. Jensen looks blank.

“A girl. She was working in the Texas government. Jeff had known for a while that she was a Cali agent. Somehow they found out. She was trying to get out – we were trying to get her out – but she didn’t make it in time. I just thought. Maybe you’d met her.”

It’s Jensen’s turn to grip Jared’s hand, run soothing fingers up his arm. “I’m sorry. No. She maybe came later. Was it – bad?”

“It’s always bad.”

Jensen ducks his head in acknowledgment.

“Sadie found her,” Jared says. “She’s an incredible dog. She – I kept thinking, after you – I didn’t have her then. She came to me the next year. I used to think, maybe if I’d had Sadie, maybe I’d have found your body.” His voice is unraveling, sticking in his throat. “I hated it. That I couldn’t find you. We couldn’t bury you.”

He scrubs a hand over his eyes. “I couldn’t even give you that. I didn’t save you, and then I couldn’t even fucking find you. It’s what I do, and I was fucking useless.”

Jensen reaches out and touches his shoulder. “Hey. Quit blaming yourself. At least you tried. Sounds like you’re the only one who was looking for me, not what I knew.”

Jared swallows. “You remember? What you knew?”

“Kind of.” Jensen laughs, brief and strained. “I remember I’d swiped the contents of Zach’s computer during that last visit, after he told me he’d done it. I had it on a special flash drive Jeff gave me.”

Jared blinks. More pieces of the puzzle are falling into place.

“Fuck,” he says. “I wondered why you were still alive.”

Jensen grimaces. “Yeah,” he says. “The Republic must have known or suspected I had something. I guess they sent Danni to find out what I knew, then keep an eye on me and try to get me to remember.”

“That was a Republic agent, on the boat,” Jared says. “It looks like they’ve changed plans. They’re going for the kill, now.”

“Huh.” Jensen purses his lips and blows out a breath. “So – they wanted the tech, but even more, they don’t want to risk anyone else getting their hands on it?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Jared says. “How’d you get out, back then?”

“I’m not sure,” Jensen says, squeezing Jared’s knee briefly. He moves his hand back to his own thigh but Jared can still feel the heat on his skin like a brand. “Something wasn’t right… I had almost no warning, but it was enough to get out of the worst of the blast. I think I remember running for the exit. I must have been knocked on the head by something heavy, ceiling beams or some shit; the hospital said I had a skull fracture and a hell of a concussion.”

Jared shivers. “God. You nearly did die.”

“I didn’t, though,” Jensen says. “And I’m pretty sure I got out of there with the information I’d gone for.”

“Okay,” says Jared. “So, we get that, and get everyone off your back.”

Jensen sighs and leans back, dropping his head against the dirt wall. He looks exhausted.

“Yeah, well, it couldn’t be that easy. I don’t know where the drive is. I don’t remember Dean ever having it.” He sighs again. “Maybe someone took it. Or maybe I mailed it to myself. Maybe I left it in my hotel room, or dropped it in the river, or it’s in the hospital Lost and Found… God, maybe Danni’s had it all along and didn’t know what she had.”

Jared knocks his own head against the wall a couple of times. “So there’s a flash drive somewhere back in Texas with a secret people are willing to kill you for, and we’re stranded somewhere short of California with wet clothes, no money, no comm devices, and no transportation.”

“Yep.”

“And we’re guilty of crossing the border illegally, resisting arrest, and keeping the secret results of a government-funded research project out of the hands of said government.”

“Yep,” says Jensen again.

“Awesome,” says Jared. “We must be guilty of at least six felonies right there.”

“What about sodomy?” Jensen asks. “Was that on our list?”

Jared chokes.

Jensen is suddenly extremely close. “Jared.” His hand comes up, slides into Jared’s hair, cups the back of his head. Jared’s heart starts trying to hammer its way out of his chest. “I don’t – I still don’t remember everything. But I’m pretty sure I remember doing this.” And he kisses Jared.


Part Four