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Chapter Text

Skyler had stopped leaving messages for Walt. Now she just called and let it ring every ten minutes—or, if Junior and Marie needed someone to talk to or distract them from their anxieties, whenever she got a free moment—between card games and feeding Holly and trying not to let Hank see how worried she was, when (irony of ironies!) he was the only one who didn't understand the danger he was in.

By this point she had given up any hope of Walt picking up, but she had to keep calling. It was the only signal she could give him of everything she felt—rage for all he'd put her through for the past year, and at herself for still caring, but worst of all—terror, that that moment, when she'd looked through the window at him, next to Holly, would be the last time she ever saw her husband.

The shrill ring of the phone was a shock to the system akin to a glass of water to the face, and Skyler almost dropped it in her eagerness to answer, not bothering to check if it was a number she even recognized.

"Hello?"

"Is he with you?"

It wasn't Walt. The frantic, somewhat manic voice on the other end of the phone wasn't anyone she knew.

She hurried into the guest bedroom, locked the door and climbed into the closet.

"Mr. White! Is he with you?"

This stranger on the other end of the line asked the question as if his own life depended on it. And maybe it did, maybe this was one of the faceless, threatening figures from Walt's shady other life, finally invading hers, no longer something she could pretend was separate. Wedged in Marie's purple guest bedroom closet, the idiocy of her husband's church and state analogy was on full display.

"Who is this?"

"I went to your house, yo. He's gone, his car is gone, I could see all the shit on the floor from you packing your stuff, like you're getting out of town, but your station wagon was still there—"

The crushing blow of realization. Gone. He's gone. Then she processed the stranger's words, and her protective instincts reared up.

"—And there was like, a note, addressed to you, like a—goodbye note, only there's a code in it, and if he's not with you, you need to tell me what this shit means!"

"What the hell were you doing in my house?"

"I only went over there because he's not answering my calls, okay?"

"What do you—do you think I am going to give my husband up to you people?"

She heard a string of curses, and then fumbling, as if someone had grabbed the phone and yanked it out of his hand, then the staticky sound of the call being put on speaker.

"Skyler, Skyler—there is no need for the hostility. We're all friends here, this is a safe place to share information. The kid is one of the good ones—relatively speaking."

Saul. Never had she been happier to hear the slick, snake oil salesman voice than now.

"Saul—what the hell is going on? Have you heard from Walt?" There was more cursing in the background. "And who is that with you?"

It took Saul a moment to get the walking string of expletives to shut up.

"I'm on the line with my client, one Jesse Pinkman. Your husband's partner. I believe you two have at least a passing familiarity with one another."

Skyler's mind went blank for a moment—what the hell was he talking about? Who?

Then it registered.

Jesse Pinkman.

Pinkman. The stoner, druggie burnout who had called her house once, who she had told off for selling Walt weed, who had threatened her sister's husband with a lawsuit. The guy whose website blared rap music. She had not thought about Jesse Pinkman for months, not since Hank had attacked him, when she had gone to Walt's new condo and pleaded with her estranged husband to get Pinkman to drop the charges—which Walt had evidently done, though just like everything else, he'd never explained how.

Of course, she hadn't wanted to know.

He'd made it out like Jesse Pinkman was an afterthought, of no consequence, a footnote in his life of crime.

"Look, Skyler, I don't know what kind of relationship you picture me having with this person. He's not my friend—it's not as if we were even close."

"His partner?"

In all of Walt's cryptic, veiled remarks about the shady underworld he'd crawled into, it had never once occurred to her that the kid who loved "MILFs" had followed him down there.

"Yeah—his business partner. His protégé, the Abbott to his Costello—or to put it in terms you'll understand, the other woman. It's an on-again, off-again thing, kind of a Ross and Rachel situation. Guess it's on again, since he's here, he seems to care where Walt is almost as much as you do, and he's convinced only you will know."

"Know what?"

"How to find the bastard. We have the treasure map, you have the intimate knowledge of our quarry. We're pooling our resources."

"Take the phone off speaker, Saul."

He obeyed her.

"What the hell is this?" Skyler hissed into the receiver. "Do you expect me to trust this person? To help him find my husband?"

"You don't have many options, here, Skyler." He lowered his voice. "This is your best play, believe me. This kid has committed felonies for Walt—something you have in common, incidentally. What he lacks in polish he makes up for in loyalty—a regular Lassie on two legs."

"Yo, shut up, Saul, I can hear every word you say."

"It's a term of endearment!"

The speaker phone came back on.

"Uh, yeah…so…hey, Mrs. White. It's good to talk to you again." She certainly wasn't about to return the sentiment, so Skyler said nothing. "We met before. I don't know if you remember. You, uh, came to my house that…one time."

Oh, yes. She remembered. She remembered telling the punk with baggy clothes to stay away from her husband and that he should consider another line of work. Apparently Pinkman had done neither, which she considered reminding him of, but that felt like a bitchy move, and if there was one thing she was sick of besides fearing for her family's safety, it was people thinking she was a bitch.

"Yes, I—remember you," she said, in a forced 'pleasant' voice that probably did read as 'bitch', in the end. Oh, well.

"You okay? You, uh—you got your kids? In a safe place?"

She wanted to snap at him that it was none of his business, but it didn't seem like there was time for her to be angry or confused about this stranger who knew God knows what about her children. And the question—this Pinkman—was so awkward it could only be sincere.

"We're with my brother-in-law, in DEA protective custody. They got an anonymous tip that the cartel is after Hank." Her fingers tightened around the phone. "I assume that's Walt's doing."

"In a manner of speaking—it was his tip by proxy."

"So, in other words—you called for Walt."

"I will neither confirm nor deny—"

"—What the hell, man. Why did you tell them it's the cartel? Those dudes are all dead."

"Do you think I was going to bandy Fring's name about with the DEA? I'm not you, kid, I don't have a death wish."

Skyler slammed her left hand into Marie's spare comforter. It was her worst fear confirmed.

"So—this Gus Fring is the man Walt has been working for all these months." She had figured, of course, but it wasn't like Walt ever actually told her anything about his work. "And now he wants him dead, what—because Hank is onto him?" She lowered her voice to a whisper, as if there was a chance Hank had bugged the closet of his own house. "Because he knows about this—laundry?"

"Well that is, uh—part of the concern, but as I understand it, there's been some personality clashes with upper management. Walter maybe doesn't have what we'd call a 'people-person-personality.'"

"You mean he's the world's biggest dick. I think she knows. Look, we don't have time to talk about this—we need to figure out where he is, like now. He's not picking up my calls."

Join the club, she thought.

"I don't know where he is! Walt refused to come when the DEA came to put us in protective custody. He insisted that—that he's the real target, and if he is at Hank's house then we're all—" Her voice broke. "If he's not at the house, then—I don't know where he is."

It was obvious where he was, wasn't it? Walt had been right. The consequences he feared…had come at last.

"Why is this even happening?" Skyler demanded, her voice shaking. "Walt told me he was essential to the business. That everything stopped without him. Was he lying about that, too?"

"Not…exactly. No."

"Then what's changed?"

The pause that followed was among the most painful of her life. She could hear arguing in an undertone, as if they were debating who had to give her the bad news.

"This is the problem with being a world-class educator like Walter," said Saul, at last. "You're that good at teaching, you render yourself redundant. You gotta make yourself irreplaceable in this business. Job security, and all that."

There is another awful pause, and Pinkman, she couldn't help notice, had stopped the cursing and rambling in the background.

"What are you talking about?"

"Well, I uh—I gather the apprentice surpassed the master—or is at least good enough to run the lab on his lonesome, by Fring's estimation."

Then she remembered. This kid was one of Walt's old students.

"Wait a minute. Fring is replacing Walt with—you? You're the reason this is happening?"

"That's not what—it wasn't like that—" She could hear guilt seeping into his voice, and there was some hysterical part of her that wished she had thought to go to this kid months ago, because Skyler was fairly certain she'd have had the whole story from him in ten minutes flat. "Nothing is gonna happen—he's gonna be fine, Mrs. White."

"He doesn't think that. Walt thinks assassins are coming after him and our whole family—so maybe you can explain to me what you know that he doesn't."

"He's paranoid as shit—you gotta trust me. I told Gus I wouldn't cook for him if anything happened to Mr. White. He needs me. He's got to have a cook who can make his formula or the—the business stops. He's not going to do anything. He knows he can't."

He sounded as though he was trying to convince himself as much as he was Saul and her, which did not fill Skyler with optimism.

"No offense, kid, but while I've always admired this song and dance routine you've got with your partner, I'm not sure when Walt is dead and Fring has a gun to your head, he's going to be as convinced the mutual death pact you two have will hold up."

"It's worked up until now!" Pinkman shouted, his voice hysterical. "Look, I swear to God, I will not let anything happen to Mr. White. If you tell me what this means I will find him and get him somewhere—I don't know. Safe, or.…whatever."

Or whatever. This was the person she had to put her trust in. Skyler would have hung up the phone in despair if not for that genuine, desperate panic that she heard in Jesse Pinkman's voice.

If she had to trust someone, he, she decided, was a better option than Saul.

"What's in this—note? How can you even be sure he wrote it?"

"It's his handwriting."

"Maybe these people—I don't know—made him write this before they took him off somewhere. Is that possible?"

"No way. I found crumpled up ones in the trash, like you know—rough drafts."

"Yeah, I don't get the impression Fring's people are the types to let their victims leave a goodbye missive for the nearest and dearest."

"Saul, what—exactly are you talking about?"

"I think the time for euphemisms has passed. What we've got here is your classic suicide note." She swallowed down her sob. "Whether it's the real deal or Walt is just stalling for time while he makes a different play is uh, harder to guess. There's some heartfelt words about your husband's gambling and his cancer coming back, so I'm fifty/fifty on whether this is just a cover for your son in case Walt is 'disappeared' by these characters, or if he's really going to go through with it."

"Go through with…what?"

"Look, I don't want to alarm you, but Jesse here checked your house and I sent Huell to sweep his condo. The gun's not in either, so…"

"What are you talking about—Walt doesn't own a gun."

As soon as she said the words, she realized how stupid they sounded.

"I guess I have to be the one to tell you, but—yeah, he does. I put him in touch with my most discreet gun guy awhile back. Of course, just because he has it with him doesn't necessarily mean he's planning on using it on himself—"

"—Just tell me what's in the note! Not the beginning—" She didn't want to think about that part, what it might mean about his state of mind, and she'd had enough of Walt's lies to last a lifetime. "The part that you think is a clue to where Walt is."

Saul read the last paragraph. Skyler closed her eyes. Her heart beat double-time, and then it started to ache.

"So…Mrs. White?" Jesse Pinkman's voice trembled. "Do you know where he is?"

Skyler opened her eyes again.

"Yes, I do. I know—I know where he's gone."

"Yeah, bitch!" She almost started to laugh, and wondered if she was having the same mental breakdown Walt had had when she told him what she'd done with the money. "Lay it on me."

Skyler gave the most detailed and exact description she could of what she thought Walt was trying to tell her. She made Jesse Pinkman repeat the directions back to her three times before she was satisfied he had memorized them, since apparently it was risky for him to have it on him, if he was 'found.'

Then she told Saul to put the note in the shredder, because no matter what happened, she was never, ever going to read it. There was a brief, tense debate about what car he should take, which mattered because he might be 'tailed'. She settled the argument, to Jesse Pinkman's satisfaction, if not Saul's.

Then, because it seemed to matter to Jesse, she explained the significance of the place.

"Seriously? That is…so fucked up." His voice was full of righteous anger—on her behalf, which was the most bizarre part. Chivalry in the strangest package. "You have anything you want me to say to that asshole, when I find him?"

"Please just…bring him back."

"I will. I promise."

She heard the slam—Jesse was out the door before Saul could give one of his lame send-off reassurances. Skyler hung up the phone, made the other call she had to make, then crawled out of the closet and onto the bed.

This was it. Walt's life was in…this person's hands. So be it.

She wasn't sure if she could trust Pinkman to keep his word—but she believed he believed he could, for whatever that was worth. Maybe it was worth a lot.

Whatever Walt had taught this Jesse Pinkman, Skyler didn't think he'd learned how to lie like him.

Chapter Text

Dusk in the Sandia Mountains had always been beautiful.

Walt drank in the sight of the peaks against the desert sky, the distinct pinks and reds which produced a visceral feeling in him, for which there was no scientific explanation.

He used to bring Skyler up here, in the Porsche, when he was young and still had licit, non-forbidden dreams—a future. Hair.

As beautiful a place as any to spend one's final moments on earth—or at least the best place within easy driving distance. There was a spot, about twenty yards off from the clearing where he stood now, a cliff from which you had a clear view of the waterfall and river below.

That was where he would do it.

This wasn't a great plan. In truth, it wasn't much of a plan at all, though it was better than sitting in his house waiting for Gus's men to show up. He'd spent too long waiting for things to happen to him to have that be the last thing he did.

There'd been another option on the table, of course.

When his survival mode had kicked in, and Walter had realized the one thing he needed—what he'd counted on, taken for granted, and then pushed right into his enemy's hands without even realizing it—another plan, dark and desperate, and come to him. It had emerged from his mind fully formed, as if from some divine (devilish?) inspiration.

Two plans. Two possible courses of action.

One gun.

Walter had never been a religious man, let alone one prone to superstition, but when he had spun that gun once, twice, three times—and each time, despite the difference in the starting point and the force applied, the barrel had landed on him—well, that felt like a sign. Of what—who knew? Judgement, damnation.

The universe telling him there was only one way this ended.

It had also served as a mocking, statistical improbability—and the disappointment Walt had felt shed any doubts he had over what he was willing to do to stay alive, to guarantee his family's safety.

To not let go of control.

And yet…

Something Jesse had said came back to him, as often happened at the strangest moments.

"Coin flip is sacred."

To him, the spin of that gun was as close to sacred as he came. Three times could not be random, could not be overlooked. Maybe Skyler hadn't been too far off the mark when she'd cast him in the role of high-stakes gambler.

(No Lily of the Valley. Not after three spins. That was betting big and losing.)

So, he was here. Honoring whatever respect for the sacred he was still capable of.

Walter looked down at the .38 Snub with the dispassion of the scientist he still was, at heart. He hadn't thought this was how he was going to use it when he had bought it from Saul's "guy." It was supposed to be for self-defense, not self-destruction.

No more prolonging the inevitable.

If this was the one thing he had left to do, then he was going to do it himself.

He lifted the gun, traced the barrel with his thumb. As soon as sunset was over, and the light had faded…then he'd do the deed.

Walter just wanted to enjoy the moment, the light and the tranquility of a New Mexico twilight, before it all went dark forever. He wanted to remember Skyler as she'd been then, not terrified, holding back tears, begging to know when he'd be safe again, when he would be able 'work this out.' When he was dead, Skyler and the kids wouldn't be in danger—no, surely not. Gus had no reason to go after his family, it could draw attention to a retired chemistry teacher he would rather the world forgot. That was why Walt never told her the details of his work, he reminded himself—it protected her. That was why the lies and secrets were necessary. And they had the car wash now—his ill-gotten gains had given Skyler that security, at least.

Now, Hank was another story. He wished he could've done more for Hank.

How long would the DEA protection hold? If only he had done a better job of throwing him off the scent, if only he would let up, but Hank was like a dog with a bone…once he got his teeth in, he'd never let go. All Walt had to rely on was Marie's overbearingness, but he knew in his heart that if his brother-in-law believed that Gus Fring was Heisenberg, he would not stop until he had proved it.

And if he did—if by some miracle the protection held, and Hank lived long enough to actually expose Gus…

What would happen to Jesse?

Jesse's fate had been the one thing weighing on him more than Hank. He had money to spare, at least. Saul could set him up with the disappearer, if he was smart enough to ask and was actually thinking of his own future. Of course, he never could count on that from Jesse—that's why Walt did it for him. It was his responsibility, one of his strongest motivations to stay alive up until this point.

Who else would look after the little idiot?

Walt's fingers clenched around the metal. He lifted it up, stared into the barrel itself, which anyone in a rudimentary gun safety class would say was a terrible idea. Who the fuck cared, at this point?

He should get it over with.

"Really? This is the spot you pick?"

Walt's insides froze up. For a moment he wondered if he had pulled the trigger and this was the afterlife.

It would have to be hell.

"The place where you proposed to your wife? That is—seriously messed up."

The sound of shuffling feet over pine needles, the clumsy gait—that could only be one person, and he was certainly not dead yet—through no self-preservation instincts of his own, Walt's acerbic inner voice could not help adding.

Walter turned around.

"...Jesse?"

His ex-partner stumbled out from the trail which lead back to the parking lot. Winded, Jesse grasped the knees of his ill-fitting pants to catch his breath. It took a second for Walter to realize that wherever the hell Jesse had come from, he'd run.

From that place…to here. To him.

Walt stared at him, dumbfounded. This was the one thing he had not predicted—a scenario he had not accounted for.

Jesse Pinkman was always the one scenario Walt had not accounted for.

"What are you doing here?"

"Yo—" Jesse caught his breath and straightened up. "—I'm the one who should be asking that."

Despite the fact that Walt believed he had come to terms with his own death, the old paranoia that had dogged him for the last few months returned with a vengeance. It was like a bad habit he couldn't shake, even now, when it no longer mattered.

"Did Gus send you?" His eyes darted around the clearing, searching for a gunman—was Mike here to finish the job he'd started in the laundry? "Did you follow me?"

Jesse rolled his eyes.

"Are you gonna ask if I put a bug on your car? If I'm wearing a wire?" Jesse snorted. "No, he didn't, I didn't—and I'm not. How retarded are you?"

His face contorted into the look of incredulity that only Jesse Pinkman could elicit. His partner (ex-partner?) took a few cautious steps towards him.

Jesse eyed the gun in Walt's right hand with trepidation.

"So you really were gonna do it, huh?"

Walt ignored the question, as he often had where Jesse—and questions he didn't want to answer—were concerned.

"If you didn't follow me and Gus didn't send you," he said, irritated. "How the hell are you here?"

"Your wife."

"What?"

The kid shrugged. Once he'd seen Walt, the Jesse’s sense of urgency had ebbed. His breathing was calmer, he seemed almost—normal, at least for him, except that he kept staring at Walt's right hand.

"I went by your place and found that note you left. I figured out you'd let her know where you'd be with some code in that last bit, so I called her and she told me what it meant—where you were going. This hiking trail in the back-ass end of nowhere." He waved his arms about. "You proposed here, right?"

Jesse looked around the clearing.

"Guess it's—kinda pretty. Fucking far, though. You were a bitch to find." He rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet, with the old twitchy Jesse energy he seemed to have lost since Gale. "I thought you might be…you know…"

He trailed off, and Walt realized that the emotion his partner was trying and failing to mask.

Relief.

A far cry from what he felt, now that the surprise had worn off. Jesse's presence drained all romance out of the clearing for Walter, leaving him with nothing but burning frustration. Now the last memory he would have of this place would be him yelling at Jesse for yet another fuck-up.

"You…called my wife?" Walt's voice turned into a low growl. "You thought you had the right to call my wife?"

"Uh—yeah. No shit."

"Where did you—" He paced in front of Jesse. "How did you even get her number?"

"Saul gave it to me, duh."

Saul. Goodman was lucky he would be dead before Walt got a chance to fire him again. Attorney-client privilege his ass.

"And you actually spoke to her? You spoke to Skyler."

"Uh…yeah."

It shouldn't have, on the day he expected to die, but this fact—Jesse talking to Skyler on the phone, and being so blasé about it—felt like the pièce de résistance of all disasters.

"What—what did you say to her?"

Jesse said nothing, instead staring at Walt like he had grown two horns. As if it wasn't the obvious next question he needed an answer for in the circumstances. It was a look that Walter knew well, and it never failed to annoy him. He was not the insane one, here.

Pistol still in his right hand, Walt rushed forward and grabbed Jesse by the lapels of his leather jacket.

"What did you tell her, you little shit?"

"Relax, geez! I was just trying to find out where you were." He shoved Walt away. "There wasn't a lot of time for chit-chat, yo. What, you think I was in the mood to wax poetic about us melting Emilio and Krazy-8?"

The paranoia receded like the tide. Walt took several calming breaths, to steady himself. It didn't work.

"What did she—is she alright? Did she make it to Hank's okay?"

"Yeah, she's been with your douchebag brother-in-law for hours. Which you would know if you would pick up your damn phone."

Jesse's scolding reminded him, unpleasantly, of Skyler at her most passive-aggressive.

"I left it in the car," he said, in a tight voice. "I am not getting reception out here, anyway."

"Have you been out here since this afternoon? Because you sure as shit didn't pick up my calls."

Walt watched Jesse cross his arms, and his own incredulity rose like bile in his throat. The little ingrate had the temerity to be—what, upset with him right now?

"Why would I answer your calls, Jesse? You made where we stand abundantly clear last night. Thirty seconds after you kicked me out of your house, Gus's goons tased me, put me in the trunk of a car with a sack over my head, took me out in the desert and threatened to kill my entire family."

Under the fierceness of his anger, Jesse wilted—chastened. It gave Walt a brief, flickering fillip—cold comfort now, but it was better than nothing.

"So, I'm sorry that taking your calls was not high on my list of priorities. For all I knew you were only calling me on his behalf—to find out where I am."

"Do you think I would do that?" Jesse asked, voice indignant. "Rat you out?"

"Why not? Aren't you his guy, now?" Walt tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice and failed. "You're cooking for him without me."

Jesse stared at him, with that wounded look that always reminded Walt of a dog with a tail between his legs. He could tell the boy felt guilt for the situation, and though that should have given him a perverse sense of pleasure, all it did was make Walt feel guilty himself—no one wanted to be the man who kicked the dog.

Guilt. He was sick to death of that emotion. Soon, maybe literally.

Jesse rallied quickly.

"So, what? This is it? This is the great Heisenberg's plan? Go out in the woods, blow your own brains out after giving your wife a clue where your corpse can be found?"

When it was put like that, in Jesse's typical slang-ridden, inelegant style, it sounded—well, pathetic. But he was not going to waste his breath justifying himself to this—this—

"I do not owe you an explanation for my actions."

"Don't owe me?" Jesse laughed, hysterically. "Bullshit you don't owe me. After what I've done for you—"

"—I am not having this argument with you again—"

"—You make me waste Gale to save your sorry ass, then two months later you waste your own ass, and you expect me to be cool with that?"

"What I—asked you to do—was as much to save you as it was me. Do you really think if Gale were alive and I had let Mike kill me that night, Gus would have let you go free?"

Jesse said nothing, merely glared at him, looking more and more like the kid Walt would always think of him as—a teenaged punk who, when faced with the clear proof of the wisdom of his teachers, scrunched up his face and doubled-down on whatever idiotic rebellious fancy he had taken.

"He would have hunted you down. You saved your own life, Jesse—"

"—That's not why I did it."

When he looked into Jesse's eyes, saw the same burning resentment that he had seen a week ago, when Jesse had said those words—"After everything I did for you—"

He knew, deep down, that even if it was true, saving himself had been the last thing on Jesse's mind that night.

"Look, I was perfectly willing to…do the deed myself," Walt said, in a gentler voice. "But Mike intercepted me before I could make it to Gale's apartment. If I had known the effect it would have on your state of mind, believe me, I would have left my house sooner, and I never would have called you that night and asked—"

"—What the hell does—"

"—And God knows I would have used the ricin on Gus myself, too, if that was an option for us."

"'State of mind'?" Jesse repeated, in an incensed voice. "What was my state of mind?"

"Let's see: between turning your house into a drug den, getting back on meth—and clearly not giving a damn whether you lived or died—I think the word for it would be 'fragile.'" He let out an exasperated sigh. "I can't believe I thought there was even a chance you would give it to him, after what a wreck Gale made you. This is what comes from listening to Saul's advice."

Walt meant the comment more as self-recrimination than anything else, but Jesse, in his typical touchy way, took what was meant to be an honest and objective statement of the facts as a personal affront.

"Oh, I'm sorry that I don't get off on killing people like you do!"

Walt jabbed his free hand into Jesse's chest.

"Is that what you think? Do you think I enjoy all of this? You think running over those gangbangers was a thrill for me?"

"I never asked you to do that!"

"Oh for God's sake—" He looked up at the sky, the stars just visible. "What did you expect me to do, Jesse, just let you die?"

He realized he had fallen into the trap before even Jesse did, which showed that it had not been deliberately set for him. But as the kid was not actually as stupid as he looked, even his idiotic partner figured out Walt had stepped right into it.

"No—" Jesse said, in a quiet voice. "I guess not."

Walt felt his shoulders slump. All the energy that arguing with his young partner had rallied in him drained away.

"…It's not the same thing."

"Who says?"

Walt lowered the gun. He was suddenly exhausted. Only Jesse had this effect on him. More than the cancer, around this little punk he felt far older than his nearly fifty-one years.

Jesse Pinkman was bad for his health. How the hell had he gone into remission working with him?

He collapsed onto a rock, clutching his gun like a life preserver.

"Jesse…let me tell you something."

"I'm really not in the mood for one of your—"

"—Just—let me talk, okay?"

Jesse nodded at him and sat down on the grass in front of him. He gripped his knees, and Walt was reminded painfully of Junior curled up in front of the fireplace when he was a child, waiting for Skyler to read 'Twas The Night Before Christmas.'

Jesse was nothing like Junior, but he kept—making Walt think of him. Why was that?

"When we first started working together, you asked me why I was doing this. Why after fifty years on the straight and narrow, I would decide to…go this direction. I told you I was awake. Sometime later you discovered that I was in chemotherapy, and you inferred that my motives were altruistic. That I was doing it for my family—to leave them money after I'm gone. The truth, Jesse…is that that was one reason, the major reason, but it was not the only reason."

He rubbed his bald head, suddenly not able to meet Jesse's eye.

"The truth is I would never have done any of this if I did not know that there was an end date. That I have an end date. The last year I have never felt more alive, but that feeling has come…at a high price. I made choices, and I have to live with the consequences of them. But I will not let my family face those consequences, do you understand me?"

His voice darkened, and he felt a strange sort of calm. Resolution.

"There is only one way this ends, Jesse. There has always been only one way that this ends, and I realized this morning that I still have a choice. I could sit in my house waiting for someone else's choice to happen to me, or I could go out, and for the last time make my own." He held up the gun. "I need you to respect that choice. Do you understand?"

It was a version of the speech that he had given Skyler, and if Walt had been expecting Jesse to dramatically tear up as his wife had, he was disappointed to get a flat, sarcastic shrug, instead.

"Whatever. You got a death wish, fine. Do it. I'm not gonna stop you."

Walt hated how honest he was feeling, because honesty forced him to admit that Jesse's apparent indifference to his fate actually bothered him.

"Thank you. I…appreciate that."

Jesse didn't move.

"So…yo, are you gonna do it, or what?"

Walt squinted at him.

"I'm not going to shoot myself in the head in front of you."

Jesse got to his feet, brushing the dirt off his pants with deliberate casualness meant to set Walt's teeth on edge.

"Why not? If you're feeling all self-sacrificial and shit, I figured you'd want an audience."

"This is not a joke."

"You know, I'm not sure you even have the balls to do it," Jesse continued, as if he hadn't heard him. "But I'm not gonna pull my trigger until you pull yours. So, I'm staying"

"Pull what trigger?"

He had known Jesse had low points, when his own fate mattered very little to him, but he hadn't gotten the impression that was what this was.

"You got a plan—well, I got a plan, too."

Walt stood up, alert to the danger. Jesse and plans…like Jesse and thinking…was a bad combination.

"What plan?"

"Simple. When you kill yourself, I'm gonna drive to your douchebag brother-in-law's house and tell him and the rest of your family—everything."

It was such a nonsensical, bizarre thing to say in the circumstances that Walt was rendered momentarily speechless by it.

"Do you hear me? I am gonna march right in there and tell your son that you've been cooking crystal for the last year. I'm gonna confess—for the both of us."

"What are you talking about?"

"Everything, Mr. White. Emilio, Krazy-Eight, Tuco. I will tell them everything. The feds will Rico the shit out of your house, your new car wash. Your family will know the truth and they will have jack shit to show for it."

For a minute all he could do was stare into that face.

Then the rage came.

"You're not going to do that, Jesse," Walt seethed at him. "Do you hear me? You will do no such thing."

"It's gonna be hard for you to stop me, since you'll be dead."

Walt reflexively went for his pocket, then he remembered.

"You left it in the car, remember? Besides, you're not getting a signal out here, and Saul's not going to side with you. I'm the one who has all the money now."

A surge of righteous outrage hit him like a tsunami wave, and Jesse must've seen it on his face, because he took a few steps backwards. Walt stalked towards him, waving his gun about like he used to wave magic markers at Jesse in fourth period chemistry.

"Even if you were stupid enough to do that, have you forgotten about Gus, genius? Do you honestly think he will let you get two steps into a house crawling with DEA agents?"

"Maybe. You'll be dead, so he'll need me."

He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Except it was Jesse logic, so—he could, in fact believe it.

"Gus can always find another chemist. If he thinks for even a second there's a chance you're going to blow up his entire business, you become a loose wire he will cut."

Walt squinted at him, a new suspicion rising.

"Is this a drug thing? Are you high right now? Is that where the death wish is coming from?"

"Seriously? You're going to lecture me about death wishes?"

Walter threw his hands up in the air, exasperated, but Jesse cut him off before he could speak.

"So what if I did have one? I got to respect your choice to off yourself, but if I want to do the same thing, that's not cool? How does that work?"

It was such an absurd false equivalence that Walt would not deign to respond to it.

"You know, you're so busy acting like this falling on your sword shit is noble, you're not even thinking about how it affects me. You dying is basically me dying by default."

"Excuse me? What universe do you live in? My death is the best thing that could happen to you right now. It is a guarantee that Gus will keep you alive at any cost." He shoved Jesse on the shoulder. "So long as you don't fuck it up by running to the DEA!"

"Until when? Until he finds a new Gale? Yo, if I can learn it, anyone can!"

The hair-trigger temper only Jesse could provoke flared up—along with his pride. Anyone? Anyone?

"You listen here, you ungrateful shit, you did not learn that formula from anyone, you learned it from me." He grit his teeth. "Just don't give him any excuse to get rid of you, and you will be fine."

"It's a little late for that."

The bottom dropped out of Walt's stomach. He grabbed Jesse by the shoulders and forced the boy to meet his eyes.

"What are you talking about, Jesse?" He shook his partner like a rag doll. "What—did—you—do?"

His partner jerk out of his grip and shoved him in the chest.

"I told Gus if something final happens to you I am not cooking for him. We never got into the specifics of how that final thing happens, so as far as I'm concerned whether it's you or him, it's the same. I made my position clear."

The logic was moronic, but the impulse to rail at him for that was overcome by another, more immediate and visceral emotion.

"…You told him that?"

"Yeah," Jesse said, with a look of defiance in his eyes.

He had of course known this to be the case. Walt had even said as much to Gus just this morning, because there was no logical reason for Gus to keep him alive if he thought Jesse could run the lab himself—except if he believed there was a chance Jesse wouldn't cook for him. In spite of all his bravado, though—or maybe because of it—Walt hadn't quite believed it himself.

After all, would he be here now, prepared to carry out this final, degrading act, if he had thought there was any other way?

(There had been another way—A voice whispered in his ear—you didn't take it. It would have worked.)

Maybe. But coin flip was sacred, as was the spin of the gun.

"And Gus really buys that? I mean, you made him believe it?" He kneaded his forehead. "That is—you're convinced that he believes you?"

"Let's see—I told him at our two hour and eighteen minute dinner—" Jesse checked one finger. "—I told him when we were in Mexico after I watched him poison half the cartel, and I told him this morning when some jack-off DEA agent raided the laundry. I don't think I could make it any damn clearer. If he doesn't believe me, that's his problem. I'm not getting a super homo Kill Mr. White And I Quit tattoo on my forehead."

The worst feeling in the world, thought Walter, was not being able to give the last word. Jesse had rendered him speechless, left staring at the younger man, unable to admit what that loyalty meant to him, not even at the end. Thinking he'd lost that loyalty forever was the reason he was out here in the first place.

Out of nowhere, he thought of what Junior had said the day after his birthday—that his son preferred to think of him as a weeping mess hopped up on pain killers than as the detached, soul-dead secret keeper he had become in the last year.

Why did he keep thinking of Junior?

"So…what's your move here?" Walt said, at last. "What exactly do you intend to do?"

"I told you. I'm waiting for you to do it, so I can bring your body back to your family when I go to explain to them everything that happened."

Walt gave him one of his patented are you insane? looks, which he knew had zero effect on Jesse, but we're almost a hair trigger response at this point.

"But you know what, I could also just trust that you're going to do it and you got like, stage fright or some shit right now. I might just leave and go straight there. It's getting dark."

Jesse started to walk back towards the trailhead, a dramatic swagger to his step.

"Wait a minute—stop—Jesse!" Walt clumsily lifted the gun. "You take another step, and I'll shoot."

He didn't really know if he should point it himself or Jesse, so he split the difference, waving it back and forth between the two. His partner looked over his shoulder, unimpressed by being held at gunpoint, which didn't shock Walt, as he'd never had a particularly reliable sense of self-preservation.

"You are not going to Hank and Marie's house, Jesse," he said, in a 'forcing himself to be patient' voice. "It would be insane to do that. You will go to jail for the rest of your life—and besides, you don't even know their address."

"Yeah, I do."

"Oh, really? Then tell me where they live."

"4901 Cumbre Del Sur Court—North East, bitch."

The color drained out of his face.

"Why are you doing this to me? Why?"

Walt glanced at the gun in his hand, then looked back up at Jesse—wondering if he could possibly get this idiot to believe that he would actually shoot him.

"You tell me your reason first."

Walt lowered the gun again. If he was not prepared to explain himself to his own wife or son, he was certainly not going to waste his breath on Jesse of all people.

"What is this, Jesse? Is this you getting back at me?" He held the pistol out, pointing at it with his free hand. "Do you think you can hold the threat of telling my family and getting the money taken from them over my head, to prevent me from pulling this trigger?"

His partner said nothing.

"Is this…blackmail?"

Jesse sneered, and Walt was disturbed to see some strange funhouse mirror version of himself staring back at him.

"What can I say?" He lifted his arms. "I guess cooking meth is not the only thing I learned from you, asshole."

Walt felt an unexpected stab of betrayal. This ungrateful little piece of—how could he do this to him, after everything that had happened? Everything they'd been through together?

As soon as the thought crossed Walt's mind, he realized—there was no way he was going to do this. Jesse was not cruel, it was not in his nature, and that's what this would be—an act of cruelty.

It was a bluff, it had to be a bluff.

Walter lifted the gun and held it to his temple.

Jesse would not actually let him do this right in front of him, and even if he did – and what was the problem, really, after all, that was what he had come out here to do, Jesse as a witness hardly made a difference, and if he could convince Gus that he'd been the one to pull the trigger, so much the better—even if he did watch Walt blow his brains out, there was no way Jesse had the stomach to drag his corpse to Hank and Marie's house and subject them to the added horrors of a full confession.

He cocked the .38 Snub.

"I'm going to do it," Walt said, somewhat feebly.

"Right. Whatever, man."

He's really going to do this to me, Walt thought, seething. He's going to make my last moments on earth as undignified as possible.

He slowly raise his finger toward the trigger, repeating the logic in his head, like it was a mathematical formula—there was no way Jesse was going to carry out that threat—it didn't make sense, no sane, rational person would do something so pointlessly self-destructive.

And as Walt stared into those unblinking, still-defiant blue eyes, he remembered Gus's warning, Mike's story of the murderous wife-beater and the danger of half-measures, what, in truth he had been telling himself, deep down, probably since the moment he had spotted Jesse rolling off that roof.

Jesse Pinkman was not a sane, rational person. He was an out-of-control, Funion-eating junkie.

Jesse Pinkman might do it.

Walter White cursed and dropped his .38 Snub to his side. His partner gave him a wide, shit-eating grin, and Walt would not have been surprised if the next words out of his mouth were "checkmate, bitch!"

Instead, Jesse sprinted forward and hurled himself at Walt.

Chapter Text

The two grappled for the gun, elbowing each other in the face, fingers and thumbs jabbed in eyes. It was the worst possible rematch of his life, in what he had optimistically thought was the most romantic place.

The .38 Snub slipped out of Walts hand's—they both dived for it. His partner managed to grab it with both hands and rolled on his side and out of Walt's reach, the gun clutched to his chest. It was only after Jesse unloaded a round in the side of a tree that Walter remembered he had not put the safety back on.

"Shit!"

Jesse snatched the gun up and scrambled inelegantly to his feet. Walt tried to follow suit, but his partner kicked him in the stomach and he fell down and rolled over pine needles, wheezing.

"Jesse—Jesse, give me that back!" His yell turned into a series of coughs. "You're going to shoot—your damn—foot off!"

Jesse scrambled backwards, panting hard. He put the safety back on and waved the gun in front of his face. Walt pulled himself out of the dirt, muttering profanity under his breath.

"Oh, you want this, bitch? Come and get it!"

Jesse turned and sprinted in the opposite direction, and it took two seconds for Walt to realize that he was heading towards the cliff, with the view of the waterfall that had seemed the most picturesque spot in the world to propose marriage to Skyler seventeen years ago.

No no no—

He staggered to his feet and hurtled after Jesse, but the little shit had at least ten yards on him, and he was just rounding the tree line when he saw his partner hurl the .38 Snub off the cliff and into the churning waters of the river.

He stumbled and stopped at the cliff edge next to Jesse. Walt watched as it fell in a comically huge arc and plunked into the rapids below and out of sight. Jesse looked down at his handiwork with the kind of idiotic satisfaction he probably got from a high score in a video game.

"You…"

Jesse was small, but like the blowfish Walt had once compared him to, he could puff himself up when he needed to. Walt recognized that squaring of the shoulders well—Jesse was spoiling for a fight.

Which was good, because he wanted to rip the boy limb from limb.

"How could—why did you—"

He rounded on Jesse, arms stretched out, fingers balled into fists—

"Do you want some?" He tapped his chest. "Bring it, old man. I will gladly kick your ass again."

The memory of his head being smashed against a glass table, and worse, what he could remember of that conversation with Junior the next day, stopped him from following his baser instinct—wrapping his fingers around Jesse's neck and choking the life out of him.

Instead, he seethed in boiling hot anger in the junkie's direction for a few moments, which seemed to unsettle Jesse more than assault would have.

"Do you have any idea what you've done?" Walter demanded, through gritted teeth. "That gun was the only thing we had to defend ourselves."

Confusion rapidly overtook the anger on Jesse's face, and the blowfish deflated again.

"What if you were followed? What if one of Gus's goons is waiting for us at the trailhead?" He paced in front of Jesse. "Thanks to you, we're sitting ducks."

"No one followed me, yo!"

"You can't possibly know that. That junker you drive sticks out like a sore thumb."

"Good thing I took your wife's car, then."

It took Walter a second to fully comprehend his partner's words.

"You drove Skyler's Wagoneer here?" Jesse rolled his eyes. "You stole my wife's car—out of the driveway of my house—the house which Gus's men are undoubtedly watching?" He waved his hands in the air. "Brilliant move, Jesse! I'm sure that threw them off the scent."

Walt heard a faint rustling from the bushes, and immediately tried to duck behind a tree.

"Will you quit it with that shit? I did not steal it. Your wife had one of the dudes who works at your car wash pick it up and drop it there for me. Even gave it a wax and polish before I drove it out. No one saw me."

Walt poked his head out from behind the tree, just in time to see a chipmunk skitter up it.

"So Skyler lent you her car." Jesse pulled a face. "What, you're buddy buddies with my wife now?"

"If wanting to find you before you did something fucking retarded makes us buddies, then yeah, I guess so."

He stepped out from behind the tree.

"Do you have a gun with you, at least?"

Jesse eyed him in a way that reminded Walt of how you'd approach a crazed mental patient—or the unibomber. He did not appreciate being looked at like that by Jesse of all people.

"If I did," he said, cautiously. "I wouldn't tell you."

In other words, yes, he did. Walt eyed his belt and his jacket—there was no bulge in either, but that didn't mean Jesse wasn't carrying one on him. Maybe he was keeping it in the car.

His eyes flicked back to Jesse's face, calculating his partner's next move.

"Let me guess, you spent a few weeks with Mike and now you think you're—what, Quick Draw McGraw?"

"Who the hell is that?"

"If you have a weapon, this would be a good time to consider getting it out. We need to be thinking about defending ourselves in case you were followed. Do you think I want to be shot?"

"Uh, yeah. You came out here to do it yourself, what the hell does it matter who pulls the trigger?"

"If I have to explain that to you after all this time—"

"Oh my God, do not give me one of your speeches about, like, the right time to die. Newsflash—there is no right time to die. Dying sucks!"

Walter realized that staring at the river Jesse had thrown his gun into was not going to miraculously retrieve it, so he turned and stalked back towards the clearing.

"Impressive philosophical observation. In addition to sucking, do you know what else death is? Inevitable. A universal fact of life—and rather more immediate for middle-aged men with stage-3 lung cancer."

Jesse followed him, practically jogging to keep up.

"Shut up! You're in remission."

"That does not mean I am cured." He stopped and turned on his heel. "Statistically I have a year or two at the most, outside chance."

"So, beat the odds!"

"I'm a meth cook who was just fired by his sadistic drug kingpin boss—you remember him? The one who hates loose ends? I think my odds are somewhat shortened from that."

Jesse's expression went from defiant anger to worry in a flash not unlike a gunshot.

"So, like…that's why you weren't at work this morning? Gus fired you?"

"Among other things." There was no point in repeating those other things, because between Saul and himself, Jesse had enough of the picture. "He told me not to go back to the laundry and not to contact you. It's why I had Saul call in the tip to the DEA. I don't know how long they'll be able to hold Gus off, but it was my only option. Hank doesn't deserve any of…this."

Jesse stuck his hands in his pocket and rubbed his toe into the dirt, looking every bit the chastened kid that had always been Walt's most familiar and comforting image of him.

It occurred to him that Jesse didn't deserve any of this, either.

Walter sighed.

"How long have you been back, anyway? I know you were cooking the day before yesterday in the lab without me."

"Since…that morning."

"I cannot believe you didn't even call to let me know you made it out of Mexico. I had to resort to asking Hank for information about what was going on with the cartel." He let the indignity of that sink in for Jesse before continuing his lecture. "Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

Jesse scowled at him.

"Uh, the last time I saw you, you told me you hoped I ended up buried in a barrel in the desert. So no, I didn't!"

The irritating fly of guilt creeped over Walt's spine. He tried in vain to shove it away, along with the memory of that fight.

And what had happened after.

"You are never going to let me forget that, are you?"

"And you're never going to say you're sorry," Jesse shot back, his resentment palpable. "So I guess we're even."

"I did say I was—" Walt stopped himself, remembering that it had not been Jesse that he admitted that to. He raised his arms in a magnanimous gesture. "…Look. Things were said in the heat of the moment. Things neither of us meant."

"Speak for yourself. I meant every damn word."

Walt sighed, too tired to argue. Anyway, nothing Jesse had said to him had not been deserved.

"Well. You obviously didn't end up buried in a barrel in the desert, so I suppose you were fine without my help after all."

A funny look of satisfaction crossed Jesse's face. Walt didn't like it one bit.

"That kills you, doesn't it? You would have preferred it if I had."

The sharpness of it cut through him. Rarely had Jesse hit on the truth with such devastating accuracy. Walt used every ounce of self-control he still had not to let on how right his partner was. Him seeing through Walt that way had probably been an accident—he certainly wasn't about to hand Jesse that kind of a weapon now by admitting he was right.

"I am relieved you're alive." It was the truth—or half of it, which would have to do. "Did Gus really have you show the cartel chemists how to cook my formula?"

"Yeah. They even tested the purity. With some like, little machine thing." He rubbed the back of his elbow. "Mine was, uh—96.2."

Walt nodded—then he realized Jesse was waiting for him to say something more specific about this, with one of those intense looks of expectation he occasionally got.

"Well, that's—very good," said Walt, trying to keep his voice out of the neutral chemistry teacher, honestly evaluating his students' work. "Especially considering you were working in an unfamiliar laboratory."

"Yeah, thanks." Jesse kicked a nearby stump. "You don't have to be a condescending prick about it."

"What do you want me to say? That it's not a good number?" He made an exasperated sound in the back of his throat. "Then you'd be complaining I was being too critical."

"Aren't you at least going to ask what I did wrong, how I screwed it up, 'like I always do'?"

This throwing back of his words in his face wasn't helping the situation, but there was a small part of Walter that was glad their fight had apparently been weighing as heavily on Jesse as it had on him. Walt decided to take the tact of forced patience.

"Well, not having been there myself, I can hardly evaluate your work. Unless you know what it is that you did wrong. But if you knew what it was you had done wrong, then you wouldn't have done it, correct?"

"Their lab was dank." Jesse rubbed the back of his head—one of his awkward, fidgety movements that usually set Walt's teeth on edge but here and now felt…strangely comforting. "The whole time we were down there I kept thinking about how apeshit you would go if I let the RV get half as dirty as that place."

"It's hardly surprising. I have been in legitimate industrial labs that cut corners. Even the smallest contaminant can cause chemical impurities."

"Oh yeah, you should've seen all the flies."

Walt's lip twitched.

"There was a moment there I thought…that Gus and Mike had really fucked it up by bringing me and not you."

"What happened?"

"They—expected me to synthesize the phenylacetic acid myself."

Walt narrowed his eyes. Who were these people? Synthesizing in a filthy lab? No wonder Jesse had not been able to get the highest purity possible.

"Gus managed to get us out of that one by convincing them that I'm some big shot who expects it to be done for him."

Walter's chest tightened. He imagined how he would've felt, had Jesse never returned from Mexico—all because he didn't bother to teach him something a high school chemistry student should have been able to do. Of course, he would never have known that was the reason, what he would have blamed himself anyway.

And he would have been right.

"I'm sorry, Jesse. It never occurred to me that you would need to do that. I could always—"

Walter stopped himself. There was not going to be any time to teach Jesse how to synthesize the phenylacetic acid on his own. He had come out here to die.

Why was Jesse so good at making him forget that?

"You mentioned something before. About Gus poisoning the cartel." He had other things on his mind, and it had sounded like an absurd Jesse-ism, so he hadn't thought to follow up on the details. "What the hell happened down there, exactly?"

Jesse told the story, in his usual rambling style. He was clearly irritated every time Walt stopped him for clarification on a point so absurd he could not believe it, this shoot out and car chase high on the list, but eventually he got through it. Righteous indignation—a welcome feeling, after all the horror he done this past year—swelled in his chest.

"So let me get this straight," Walt said, in a tightly wound voice. "He brought you down there to teach them my formula and then offered to sell you to them as their captive cook. Their slave."

"It was just a ploy," said Jesse, and to Walter's immense irritation, he started to defend Mike, of all people.

"'Just a ploy'? And what is this ploy hadn't worked?" A million horror situations flashed through his mind. "What if they had not drunk Gus's poisonous tequila? What if they'd made you drink it? What if he died along with them?"

"Then I guess you'd be happy, asshole, considering you've been trying to get me to poison the guy for like, a month!"

He was not going to point out the profound stupidity of this statement, how the time and place of Gus's death mattered, and how it would be all for nothing if Jesse was stuck in Mexico because of it, in danger, away from his protection and not capable of helping Walt clean up the ensuing mess.

It wasn't worth it.

"Did he explain to you why he poisoned these men, at least?"

"Some kind of act of revenge, yo. He took me to that nursing home where the dude in the wheelchair with the bell lives—you know, Tio, from out in the desert? Taunted him, saying he killed his whole family. He told me after it was because those people killed someone close to him."

An act of revenge. Gus was so icy, cold-hearted, reptilian, it had never occurred to Walter that such a passion stirred in the man.

"And this," he said in a heavily sarcastic voice. "This man, is the one that you want to work for."

This is the man you are siding with over me, a small, pathetically jealous part of him said—to himself, of course, because damned if he was going to ever admit that to Jesse.

"Want to work for him? You were the one who brought me into the lab, remember? I was happy doing my own thing, I was free of you! You asked me to be partners again."

Walt rubbed his temples, wearily.

"Oh God," he groaned. "I should never have done that. I should never have brought you into this."

"What do you mean?" Jesse demanded.

"We would not be in this situation if I had not brought you into this—whole thing, with Gus."

"So you're saying this is my fault?"

"No, I'm saying it's my fault. If I hadn't done that, none of this would've happened. Gale would be alive and still in the lab, Hank wouldn't suspect anything about Gus Fring. My family would not be in protective custody right now. You would…"

He trailed off. Jesse would—what? Like most things in his life, Jesse was the one thing he couldn't predict. The fact that he couldn't predict what Jesse would do was the reason that he had made that offer in the first place.

And he had walked away from that hospital room thinking that he'd miscalculated, that the wayward partner he'd sacrificed parts of his soul he'd never get back for had slipped away from him for good.

He hadn't ever been worried about the possibility of Jesse turning on him, oddly enough. That had been the farthest thing from his mind.

"…I should have given you the money. Just offered to give you the million and a half."

Walt knew him well enough to see that he had set Jesse off.

"You think I would've taken it? That you could've paid me off?"

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

"Let me see: a twenty-five-year old gets offered one point five million dollars, no strings attached. Yes, I think you would have taken it! Anyone would."

"No strings attached?" Jesse repeated. "Since when is anything with you 'no strings attached'?"

"What, are you going to pretend like you're the Dalai Lama, now? I seem to recall you pretty adamantly wanting your $480,000."

"That was money I earned."

"What sane person would be willing to work for a man like Gustavo Fring but not be willing to take the same amount of money for nothing?" Walt moaned in despair for what might have been. "Right now you could be anywhere, doing anything you wanted."

When he chanced a look over at Jesse, he did not find a similar emotion on his partner's face. Instead of wistfulness for this imagined, limitless future, he saw a look of disgust and…some other, less obvious, but clearly negative emotion Walter couldn't quite identify.

"What am I, your stupid, bastard kid you think you can just pay off and send away to like, boarding school in Belgium or some shit?"

Not fear or anger, but—

Oh. Oh.

"Switzerland," Walt corrected, quietly. "Switzerland is famous for boarding schools."

"Whatever, man."

Hurt. Jesse was looking at him with confusion and hurt, and Walt felt his irritation grow, because he had not done anything to merit this wounded puppy dog look. Did the truth hurt? It was time for Jesse to start stop being a child and grow up.

"If you think I partnered back up with you for the money, you never knew jack shit about me."

As he stared into those eyes, brimming with unshed tears, he remembered how young Jesse really was. And that yes, perhaps he did not know anything about Jesse, besides what had been immediately useful to getting what he wanted out of the boy.

Then why? He thought. Why would you throw your life away for a man who told you he hoped you ended up buried in a barrel in the Mexican desert?

And Mike's words came back to him.

" Walt—you got a good thing going, we all do. You want to risk it all on one junkie?"

"Why did you come out here, Jesse?" Walter broke eye contact and looked down at the forest floor. "Why, for once in your life, could you not leave it alone?"

"Because I—" Jessie's voice cracked. "I…I really thought you were going to do it."

Walt looked up from the pine needles he had been contemplating straight into Jesse's eyes. Those cobalt blue, piercing eyes, swimming now with tears—and something else, something he had been desperately trying to hide ever since he found Walt with the gun in the clearing and let out that sigh Walter now realized had been of relief.

Fear. Genuine terror.

Where was this last night? Walter thought.

Truly, Jesse picked the most inconvenient time to start caring about his life.

"Would you have?"

Walt did not reply.

"Yo, if I had not gotten here, would you have done it?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "Probably. We'll never know, now."

Jesse made a sound suspiciously like sniffling.

"That is so…messed up. How could you do that to your family?"

"Really, Jesse?" Walt shook his head in disbelief. "After everything I've done, this is the line you think I can't cross?"

"I spoke to her, you know. Mrs. White. She was freaking out, okay?"

"I wish you hadn't told her about the note."

Walt had not counted on still being alive to hear Skyler's reaction to it.

"Yeah, well, she's not on board. I promised her I would bring you back, and that's what I'm gonna do."

"You promised her?" Walter repeated, snorting. "Well, God forbid you should ever lie to my wife."

He lay down on the ground and started to laugh, the memory of being in the crawlspace coming back to him with visceral force. All he managed was a weak chuckle. The absurd humor of the situation was gone, replaced with…exhaustion.

"This is pathetic, do you know that?"

Walt tried to remember if he'd ever had as much energy as Jesse did now. Oh, to be young. Maybe if Jesse ever made it to his age he would understand what it was to have reached your limit. Of course, knowing Jesse's track record for self-preservation, it seemed doubtful he would make it to twenty-six, let alone fifty. Particularly without Walt around to protect him.

"I don't recall inviting you. Do you remember where you parked my wife's car? You can show yourself back."

Jesse stared down at him, with a look of intense disgust and almost—was he seeing that right—disappointment?

"Whatever, man. You want to die? Fine, just die."

It made him think of Junior. Why had Jesse suddenly started to remind him so much of Junior? The two of them bled together in his mind.

Jesse reached into his jacket and pulled out a battered cigarette box. He chucked it as hard as he could at Walt's head. The box bounced off his shoulder and onto the ground.

"You want to die so bad? Then take it. It's still in there. Just swallow it like that asshole Socrates!"

He leaned over, turning his head towards the box on the ground. Why was he thinking so much of Walter Junior? Jesse was nothing like his son, in personality, in temperament—he was just—inexplicably Jesse.

Then he realized.

" Then why don't you just fucking die already? Just give up and die."

"That was hemlock, Jesse."

"What?"

"Socrates. He took hemlock. I'm surprised you know about that."

"I watch the History Channel. I'm not an idiot, you know?"

"At any rate—" Walt propped himself up on his forearms and picked the box of cigarettes up. "If you wanted to kill yourself with poison, ricin would not be a particularly good way to do it. Works too slowly. And besides—" He opened up the box. "It's not even in here."

Jesse stared at him, incredulous, then he snatched the cigarette box back and rooted through it.

"Where—that's impossible! It was—it was here this morning. I don't mess around with that shit, Mr. White, I swear—"

"—Calm down," Walt interrupted him. Jesse wasn't listening and he didn't obey.

He started to tear each individual cigarette apart, looking for the poison.

"Are you listening to me? It's not here. This is bad. That shit could kill someone—"

"—Relax! You didn't lose it. Saul has it."

Jesse dropped the cigarette he'd been dismembering to the ground.

"What?"

"When you went into Saul's office today, that bodyguard of his lifted it off you. He switched the box with the ricin with the one you're holding."

"Why?"

"Because I told him to."

Even after the gun had landed on him three times, the devil on his shoulder had not been able to resist. Keep your options open. There's no other way to get everything you want.

"Why the hell would you do that?" Jesse shouted. "Were you trying to give me a heart attack?"

"Not…exactly." Walt sucked in a breath. "I had a…different idea of how I might use the ricin."

A flicker of trepidation crossed Jesse's face.

"What idea?"

"It doesn't matter now. That plan is off the table."

He looked up at Jesse, whose expression had softened, like it always had in the worst of his cancer days, when his coughing fits had presumably reminded his partner of his dead aunt.

"…Besides, I don't think that plan would've gotten me anything I didn't already have to begin with."

And the cost might've been too high.

"Oh."

To his relief, Jesse didn't press him for any more details. Perhaps he correctly sensed that he didn't want to know.

"So…Saul has the ricin."

"Yes. As I very much doubt he could get it to Gus any better than you or I, it no longer matters. It's not a variable anymore."

Jesse took one of the remaining cigarettes and jammed it in his mouth.

"I really didn't get a chance to do it that night, okay?" He mumbled. "He never left the room."

"Sure. Right. Maybe I should've asked Gus. He apparently is more willing to poison himself than you are."

"Screw you, man."

Jesse pulled a lighter out of his pocket and lit the cigarette. Dark at almost fallen, so the small red ash tip stood out against his face, emphasizing the lines around his eyes. Jesse looked so much older than he had just a few months ago. Their partnership had aged him.

Walt didn't move from the spot where he lay on the ground. He half-expected Jesse to take a cigarette and wander back off towards the trail, but he didn't move.

He also didn't say anything. They both just sat in awkward silence. Finally, as it seemed like Jesse would not put him out of his misery unless he demanded it, Walt held his hand out.

"Give me a smoke, would you?"

"No," said Jesse, exhaling.

"Come on. You've got a whole damn pack."

"I'm not giving you one, yo."

"Why the hell not?"

"Hello—" In the fading light Walt could still see the look of dumbfounded incredulity. "—Have you heard of a thing called lung cancer? You know, the thing you got?"

"Even if I was going to live long enough for it to matter, one cigarette wouldn't make a damn difference."

"How do you know that?"

"Current scientific research, for a start."

"What research? You got some proof, some numbers?"

Walter rolled his eyes. God, give him patience.

"I'm not giving you a peer reviewed study, Jesse. You wouldn't even be able to properly understand it if I did."

"Yeah, well, you're in remission. I'm not going to contribute to bringing the cancer back."

It took all his self-control not to stand up and snatch the cigarette pack out of Jesse's hand. Instead he let his head drop back on the ground.

He hadn't really wanted a cigarette, anyway.

"I hope you brought a flashlight with you, since otherwise I don't know how you're going to get back to Skyler's car."

Jesse continue to smoke his cigarette in sullen, rebellious silence.

Walt sat up.

"Wait a minute—what time did you leave the lab today?"

Jesse gave a non-committal shrug and muttered some thing about the late afternoon.

"And you're in the middle of a cook?" Jesse shrugged again. "What time do you have to be back there?"

"I don't know, a couple of hours, I guess."

"You guess?" Walt repeated. "I would hope as my replacement you know the exact time you have to get the next step of synthesis going."

For all his screwing around and listening to thrash metal on his headphones during work, Jesse was actually quite fastidious and precise about timing. Walter had a distinct impression his partner was now pretending like he didn't care for the sole purpose of annoying him.

"You're really going to bust my balls about the cook? Why the hell does it matter to you?"

"Where does Gus think you are right now, Jesse?"

"Probably at home, I don't know. He doesn't own me."

"Are you so naïve that you don't realize he must be keeping tabs on you, especially if you're his only cook? I'm sure he has someone monitoring your house. What do you think he's going to assume if he can't get ahold of you?"

"That I'm at a strip club with shitty cell reception?"

"He's going to assume that you're with me, Einstein. You need to go back to your car right now, and drive down the mountain in case he's calling you. Reassure him you're coming to work and not skipping town."

Jesse flicked his cigarette onto the ground and stomped it with his heel.

"I don't wanna be out in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere freezing my ass off, so I'm happy to do that when you get your sorry ass up and come with me."

"I'm not going anywhere, Jesse, I thought I made that clear."

"So I guess we're like camping out, or something. Maybe you should've brought a tent…or a blanket."

The temperature had begun to drop, and his body shivered, treacherously. If it wasn't for Jesse, of course, he would no longer be part of this world. He would've shuffled off this mortal coil, and the issue of body heat would no longer be relevant.

"What is it going take to get you to leave?"

"You coming with me. It's the reason I came out here in the first place."

Walt contemplated Jesse for a moment, and his options. He could see that his protégé had entered the stubborn, defiant phase of the conversation, and had dug his heels in. Reason was not going to be a strategy that worked to get Jesse to do what he wanted him to do. He would have to try a different tactic.

"Right. Well, don't say I didn't warn you when Gus decides you were just as much of a liability as he thought you were and puts a bullet in your brain."

His partner's jaw tensed. Walt breathed in, preparing himself for twisting the knife with the necessary vigor to drive Jesse away. If there was anything he knew how to do, it was that.

"Since that's clearly how it's going to end anyway, you might've spared me the trouble and just ended up in that barrel in the desert after all."

Just as he intended, a flash of hurt crossed Jesse's face. Walt closed his eyes, feeling a sick sense of satisfaction at having wrested some small bit of control over the situation back. He waited to hear the retreating footsteps of his ex-partner for the last time, leaving him here to his fate.

Hypothermia was probably not the most pleasant way to go, but there would be a certain point where he no longer had the energy to move, and he would just freeze to death—it would be beyond his control to stop, even if he regretted his choice.

Out of his control once again.

"…You're unbelievable, you know that?"

He opened his eyes. Jesse was, against all logic, reason, or past experience, still standing there, above him, looking down—pissed as all get out.

"In what respect?" Walt asked, dryly.

"I just can't fucking believe—" Jesse seethed. "—That you put a bug on my car."

"Oh, God." Walt got to his feet. "Is that why you're still here? You really want to hash all that out again? Do you desperately need an apology from me before I die? Because you'll get it when hell freezes over!"

Jesse got very close to his face, and Walt found himself almost hoping for another punch to the face.

"What I want is for you to admit it."

"Admit what?"

"Admit that you're an asshole. Admit it's a shitty thing to do to your own partner. Admit that maybe I had earned more trust than you gave me."

"Trust? Do you wanna talk about trust? You lied to me!"

"You mean like how you lied to me about having cancer? About the methlamine going bad? You're in no place to judge me for that. You're like, the da Vinci of lying!"

It might've been true, but it was hardly relevant now, so Walt ignored the accusation entirely. He turned away and skulked out of the range of Jesse's fists and his irritating, piercing looks.

"Why did you even agree to do it if you didn't want to? I never asked you, you volunteered."

"Please, you were winding up your fucking sales pitch. I agreed to get you to shut up, because I knew you'd never stop nagging me about it if I didn't."

"Nagging?" He repeated, incredulously. "I did not nag you. This is not the equivalent of me asking you to clean your room or do the dishes. This wasn't a chore. It's the difference between the two of us living or dying!"

"Yeah, well, so is what I'm doing now."

"I'm not going to apologize for the car bug. In the long run, it's better that I found out, even if the circumstances by which I did so were—not ideal. Gus has been trying to drive a wedge between us, and if the worst come to pass, better he think that he succeeded."

Walt didn't add the question he was really wondering about…had Gus succeeded?

Jesse's temper, quick to flair—was also quick to cool, particularly when he was confused.

"How do you figure that?"

"It secures your position. The fewer excuses he has to question your loyalty the better."

Jesse snorted, perhaps at this time as aware as Walt was of the futility of selling himself as a careful pragmatist where self-preservation was concerned.

"Sometimes it's better if the truth just comes out. For clearing the air, anyway. I'm not sorry for doing it, and—I think hurling the bug at my face and breaking my glasses means you more than got your own back. So that's all I'll say on the matter."

"What about the other thing?"

"What other thing?"

"What you said to me! Don't act like you don't remember."

Walt gripped his forehead—the migraine really was setting in. Or maybe this conversation had caused the cancer to move to his brain.

"God, Jesse. Really? Can't you just forget about that?"

"It happened like a week ago, yo. No, I can't forget it! Did you mean it?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"One I want a fucking answer for. Did you mean what you said?" Jesse's eyes smoldered with righteous anger. "And do me a favor, will you? Don't be sarcastic, or start listing off all the reasons why I'm a fucking idiot for thinking it's possible, and just answer the damn question."

Walt made several sputtering noises, but as Jesse had correctly predicted his next rhetorical strategy, he was forced to shut his mouth again.

"…No, I did not mean it," he said, at last.

"Then why do you say it?"

He tried to come up with a lie. Funny, how he'd gotten so good at that, become the da Vinci of lying, as Jesse called him, and now, in this moment, nothing came to him. It felt more like talking to Skyler. He never could fool her.

"I suppose there was a part of me that felt…" Betrayed. "…Look, there's no reason people say things they don't mean. It happens under stress all the time. Human beings are complicated and often irrational. There's no one reason that is going to satisfy you, so just suffice it to say—I didn't mean it."

That was the best that Jesse would get. He had no intention of groveling or reenacting moments that he wish the drugs had blocked out.

Luckily for him, Jesse was content with the bare minimum of what Walt was willing to give him.

And he hadn't lied, after all. He hadn't meant it.

"How are you doing, by the way?" Jesse pointed at his forehead. "Still kind a looks like shit. You, um…recover okay?"

Walt could see there were still bruising on Jesse's face, as well—though considerably less. He'd come out the loser in that fight by a country mile, and in every way.

"Yes, of course. I was…I went back to my condo and slept it off. No harm done."

He tried to keep his voice light, but he could see that Jesse wasn't buying it.

"Did you have to explain—" He tapped his forehead. "—That to your wife?

"No, actually. After the whole black eye incident I think she's given up asking. My—son did come over. The day after was actually his—16th birthday. So when I slept through the family get-together he drove the new car we gave him over and he—saw my face."

"You missed your son's birthday party?"

"It was—more of a small family thing. He wanted to keep it simple."

Jesse shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"I'm sorry."

"Why should you be?" Walt snorted. "You're not the one who missed it. That was my fault."

It's all my fault.

"Of course, when he saw me—he asked what happened."

"So what did you say?

"That I was gambling. That's the story we're going with, by the way—did I tell you? That's Skyler's idea. I count cards at casinos—anyway, that's where I told him I was the night before. And that I—got in a fight."

"Did he ask you what happened?" Walt nodded, clutching his head. "What did you tell him?"

"I don't remember," he lied. "I was hopped up on painkillers. Besides, it's impossible to keep all the lies I've told him straight."

Not like the lies I've told you. Those I remember.

"Did you tell him you won?"

Jesse looked like he was almost on the verge of laughing.

"Not that I recall," Walt said, testily. "I didn't get into the finer details of the fight itself."

"'Cause you got your ass kicked." Walt snorted again. "What did you tell him it was about?"

"Obviously not the truth."

"You must've told him something."

Jesse was watching him so closely that he felt uncomfortable, so he turned his face towards the rising moon. Almost full. Gibbous moon.

"I think I said something about—me…starting it and…having it coming. It being my fault, that is." He twisted his wedding ring around his finger. "I mean—that was the story I gave him."

"Right. The story." Jesse nodded. "Did he…buy it?"

"I think so," he said shortly. "I think it sounded…plausible."

"Da Vinci of lying. Right."

God, after all that, maybe that would be Junior's lasting memory of him. At least you were being real.

He'd given him some version of honesty on his birthday.

"Jesse…please don't."

He so rarely used that word with Jesse—the most commonplace word of polite society, a word that had no place in their relationship—that its use now threw him off. It was like he didn't know who this strange, Mr. White-shaped person in front of him was.

"Don't what?"

"Please—don't go to Hank's house and tell them. I can't…it's bad enough Skyler knows. I can't have my son know the truth. When she's old enough I don't want my daughter to know…any of this."

"Yo, I don't think there's a way to avoid it, at this point."

There was, Walt said inwardly. There was but you wouldn't let me take it.

"Would it be so bad? If they knew."

"If my son despised me? Are you really asking if I could live with that?"

"Mrs. White doesn't hate you." Walt groaned. "For real, she doesn't hate you. She is worried as shit about you. If she hated you, don't you think she'd have just let you go through with this?"

Walter actually thought about that. It was an interesting point, to be fair—that was rare, from Jesse. It had almost seemed as though they were heading towards a real reconciliation for a minute…the smell of the new fabric softener still lingered in his mind, that brief moment when they had felt like husband and wife again.

"Skyler is one thing, my son is…a totally different story. We're talking about a sixteen-year-old who practically worships his DEA agent uncle. If he knew everything I've done…"

He couldn't even imagine what Junior's reaction would be. It had been the one scenario he'd refused to let himself imagine. Junior was still so innocent…

He couldn't picture forgiveness—not for something he wasn't all that sorry for, even now.

"I don't."

His head snapped up—back to reality—to Jesse, still standing there, unmoving. Stubbornly refusing to do what he was told.

"Don't what?"

"I don't—hate you."

The words tumbled out of his mouth, as if they'd gotten caught on his teeth and Jesse had to spit them free. Walt stared at him, suddenly irritated at Jesse's old habit of bringing up meaningless non-sequiturs at critical moments.

"What does that—how is that—a relevant comparison?"

"I don't know," Jesse said, almost defensively. "I just…I have a lot more reason to he does, and I…don't."

"'A lot more reasons'?"

"You really want to hear me list all the ways my life sucks more since we hooked up?"

Walt waved his hand—the speech he'd given in the hospital had made that clear, if the countless times he'd seen Jesse get beaten up or threatened weren't enough.

He'd never wanted to see Jesse hurt. And yet, at the same time, every time he had, it had only made him care more for the boy, want to keep him closer, watch out for him, protect him from his own worst impulses.

"It would be faster for me to just list the ways my life is better, actually. Way shorter list."

"You happen to be a millionaire, thanks to me."

"Big deal. A million bucks is not worth much if you're not alive to spend it. And that's what helping you is going to get me."

Which he hadn't asked for, of course—not that that mattered to Jesse.

"You still haven't explained why you're here."

"I just…am." Walt sighed. "Why did you come after me that night, and run those two assholes over?"

I was afraid you were going to get yourself killed, and I couldn't live with myself knowing it would have been my fault. That I could have saved you and did nothing.

"I just did."

That would have to do, for them. Neither of them knew how to say anything more, or wanted to hear it. When Walt met Jesse's eye, a mutual, strange understanding passed between them, as it often did. A pact without words.

The sun had completely set by now. Walter stood up.

"You're not going to be able to find your way back to the car if we don't go now. Come on."

They walked back to the cars in silence, Walt leading the way with the penlight on the keychain of his borrowed car. Skyler's Wagoneer and the Toyota Yaris were still the only cars in the lot when they arrived. He supposed that meant Jesse was right, and he hadn't been followed. Unless Gus's assassins had parked on the road and were waiting to ambush them…

No—no, that didn't make sense. They wouldn't risk losing Jesse's loyalty by killing him right in front of his eyes.

Jesse kicked one of the tires of the white Toyota.

"This thing is almost as shitty as your Aztec."

"It's a rental."

They both stood in front of their respective cars, neither moving.

"Well?" Walt gestured at Skyler's car. "Get in."

Jesse mirrored the gesture.

"You first."

"There are two cars, there are two of us. Ergo, we each take a car."

"I'm not really in the mood to have a car chase in this piece of shit station wagon."

"Don't be ridiculous. There's only one road off this mountain. Come on, Jesse, Gus could be calling you. You need to get somewhere with reception that's—safe."

"There's a Denny's down the way, about ten miles. I'm starving. I'll call him from there, if he even cares."

"Good idea."

"It's not like I even have his number—it'll be that asshole Tyrus who calls." Jesse gave him a sideways look. "What about you? Are you hungry?

"Not really."

"When was the last time you ate?"

"I don't remember," he said, honestly. "This morning, maybe?"

Had Skyler forced him to eat a bowl of cereal after she dragged him out of the crawl space? No, they were way beyond concerns like breakfast and cholesterol.

"Yo, you need to eat. You can get a grand slam. Senior special, whatever floats your boat."

"I'm not yet fifty-five, Jesse."

"You're close enough."

His partner shoved his hands in his pockets.

"It's safe, Mr. White. No one is going to be looking for us there. We can…figure out our next move."

Walter hesitated. He had no intention of going to Denny's—who wanted their final meal on earth to be Denny's?—but this could be the opening he needed.

"That's not a bad idea." Jesse perked up. "I'll…follow you."

He avoided meeting Jesse's hard stare.

"Maybe I should follow you."

"Don't be ridiculous," Walt brushed him off, lightly. "I don't even know where this Denny's is. I might get lost."

"We could just go in the same car, if your sense of direction sucks that hard."

"This is a rental car, I'm not going to abandon it. And I'm certainly not going to let you leave my wife's car at this trailhead."

"I don't think returning that piece of shit to Enterprise was high on your list of priorities when you drove it up here."

"Look, that's not—I thought you were hungry."

"I am."

"Then why aren't you getting in your car?"

"Cause I don't trust you to do the same."

"So, you think you deserve unfailing trust, but I'm not worthy of the same courtesy?"

"Pretty much, yeah."

"Well, I guess you're going to have to act on faith, Jesse. I will get there in—my own time."

Jesse looked between him and the two cars, and because Walter never really knew what he was thinking, when push came to shove, he could only wonder at the internal calculus going through his partner's brain.

"You know what? Screw this."

Jesse yanked the passenger door of his car open and pulled out a gun from the front seat. Surprised, Walt stumbled backwards. For one wild moment he thought that after all this, it was the end—that Gus had convinced Jesse he was the one to trust, that Walter was expendable, and he had sent an assassin who would make his last moments on earth even more painful, a monstrous betrayal on top of the ignominy of being shot and buried in the woods.

Then Jesse walked straight past him, lifted up the gun, and shot out the two back tires of the Toyota Yaris.

Walt stared at his car, then looked back at Jesse.

"Now will you get the fuck in the car?"

Walt did.

Chapter Text

"Nothing. See? I told you! He doesn't give a shit where I am."

Forty-five minutes of stressful driving in the dark later ("This thing's brakes blow!") and Walter White found himself, against all odds and personal desires, sitting in the booth of a Denny's across from Jesse Pinkman, watching him inhale a pile of pancakes heaped with berries and drizzled in what he would have charitably described as 'red goo.'

Jesse snapped his phone shut again.

Far from being reassured, the fact that Gus hadn't reached out only made Walt more uneasy. There was a part of him that didn't believe Jesse was telling him the truth about that, but given their recent tête-à-tête regarding partnerships and trust, he didn't think snatching his partner's cell phone from across the table to check it himself would be the right move. Maybe when Jesse went to the bathroom…

"Well, better you know for certain. And he still could call, so you need to be prepared for that. Now, if he does, what are you going to say?"

"That I am his loyal bitch who is coming to work tomorrow, whatever." Jesse shoveled more repulsively smothered in cherry syrup pancakes in his mouth. "What about you? Heard anything?"

He stared at his phone. Thirteen missed calls from Skyler. Three from Marie. Two from Saul, the only ones he might actually answer.

"All quiet on the Western Front."

Jesse dropped his fork and pushed Walt's untouched Grand Slam closer to him. He had never wanted it, it had been ordered for him. Was there no crisis that curtailed Jesse's appetite?

"You are so full of shit. You could at least text her to let her know you're alive."

He picked at his hash-browns. The thing was, he didn't want Skyler to know he was alive. He was quite content with her assuming the worst, because the worst was very likely to happen, and why give his wife false hopes?

He pressed a few random buttons on the phone and shoved it in his pocket before Jesse had a chance to scrutinize.

"There. Done."

He pretended to be very interested in his eggs for a minute, to avoid Jesse's scrutiny.

"Well, I guess we've got my plan sorted out. Now we got to figure out you. What's your next move?"

He had to resist the urge to get acerbic in his reply—or at least less acerbic than he would've initially liked to get.

"Difficult to say. My options are limited." He glared at Jesse. "Even more limited now that I no longer have a car."

"Yo, we have your wife's. Quit acting like you had a hard on for that rental."

"You need to take that car back to Albuquerque with you, and that is the last place that I will be going."

Jesse took a long slurp from his cup of tepid coffee, and studied Walt from across the table. He looked as though he wanted to say some thing, perhaps register a different opinion on that subject, but in a rare moment of restraint, he said nothing.

"Whatever you say, man. Are you planning on just going on the run, or what?"

"That was an option, but unfortunately it's—not anymore."

"What are you talking about?"

He explained about Saul's guy who could disappear people, and give them a whole new identity.

"Holy shit. That type of person exists? And Saul knows him?"

"He's never met the man. He only knows how to get in touch with him."

Walt pulled the vacuum cleaner repair card out of his pocket and showed it to Jesse. He didn't bother explaining how it worked, and Jesse, to his credit, didn't bother asking. He tossed the card back on the table.

"So—why is that not an option for you anymore?"

"I don't have enough money. Not for all four of us, and I'm certainly not doing it by myself."

He tried to imagine getting a new identity, moving across the country by himself, spending the last of his days as an anonymous figure among strangers, always desperately waiting to hear word that the worst that happened to Skyler, Hank and the kids, but incapable of doing anything about it. Saul had said his guy didn't allow any contact.

"What are you talking about, no money? How much does this cost?"

"Half a million," he said stirring his cup of coffee idly.

"That's it?" Jesse scoffed—oh, how far they'd come from the days of high-fiving over a 1.2 million in the RV. "Where the hell is your money?"

"…Skyler gave six hundred and twenty two thousand of it to Ted Beneke."

"Who the hell is that?"

"He's her—former boss." The words had to be forcibly pried from his mouth, it was clenched so tightly shut. "He had some outstanding IRS fines and tax irregularities. She was his bookkeeper at the time and signed off on all of it. My wife was worried that we'd come under scrutiny if he was audited." In all honesty, the sheer absurdity of her having given their money to Beneke had made the reasoning and logic of it a matter of supreme indifference to Walter—at least in the moment. "Between that and the carwash, I'm all but cleaned out."

"So your wife was cooking the books for this guy? To the tune of 600 grand?" Walt forced himself to nod. "Why would she do that?"

An involuntary black cloud crossed Walt's face.

"You would have to ask her."

This attempt to stonewall Jesse's insatiable curiosity worked about as well as getting him to do what you wanted without talking back.

"Wait…when I got out of rehab and you were in that shitty Beachcomber place…and then you got fired from J.P. Wynne and were like, super depressed and kind of channeling big loser energy, was your wife—"

"—I'm not talking about this with you right now."

His snap was apparently all that was needed.

"No fucking way! With her boss?" He buried his face in his hands and tried to massage Jesse's voice into oblivion. "Shit, that is a major dick move, Mr. White."

He couldn't tell what was worse—the glib little laugh, which reminded him of the old Jesse, before Jane and Gale, when he was still just a naive, drugged-out idiot that Walt felt an almost irrational protectiveness over—or that sliver of awkward, heartfelt sympathy. Pretty soon Jesse would be talking about opossums who lived in his aunt's floor whose wives had also fucked Ted.

"How did you guess?" A new suspicion crossed his mind. "You haven't been talking to Saul, have you?"

"No—it's just…it's on your face, yo." Jesse pointed a fork at him. "Wait, how does Saul know about this?"

Walt decided that he preferred to get this over with rather than prolonging it, because Jesse was the kind of little shit who'd actually call Saul and ask.

"He had Mike put bugs in the walls of my house."

"So Mike knows, too? Does Gus?"

"Oh, God—probably."

"And they were doing it in your house?"

Walt closed his eyes, physically pained at the thought.

"They were not—this was very brief thing that happened—after she found out, she brought divorce papers over to the apartment, and when I refused to sign them, this was her way of getting back at me, I suppose. Maybe getting back at me for everything. Well, I hope she's happy, because it worked."

He sighed and rubbed his head. God, what he would have done for some of those cancer meds.

"I just—couldn't see a point in going on without her and—the kids. I moved back into the house. I pushed her and she—pushed back. And now we have no money."

He shoveled the food around his plate.

"I'm really sorry. That sucks."

"Which part?"

"All of it. Getting cheated on, yo."

He let out a little laugh, imagining that he was about to be the recipient of some story of Jesse's high school girlfriends stepping out on him, but luckily, the boy thought better of trying to provide a comparable example.

"Why don't you tell me any of this at the time?"

"Why would I, Jesse?" Walt snapped—it really was an idiotic question. "What are you, now, my therapist?"

"No!" said Jesse, defensively. "But I'm your partner."

"You weren't at the time. We had gone our separate ways, and we were hardly on the best of terms, you will recall."

"Yeah, because you were being a major dick to me about cooking without you."

Walter couldn't argue with that logic. But even if they had been working together at the time, he would've never willingly admitted to Jesse that Skyler was sleeping with Ted. Having Jesse's respect mattered too much to him. The only thing more valuable to Walt was his loyalty.

See where valuing that had gotten him. To Denny's.

"So your plan was to pay Saul's guy for all four of you?"

"I realize there are issues with that plan—particularly having to explain it to my son—but yes, that was my exit strategy. It was a last resort."

"I could give you the money." Walt rolled his eyes and buried his face in his hands. "I'm serious! I've got it all in my trunk right now. If you still want to go through with it, I'll help you get your wife and kids away from the brother-in-law."

"I'm not taking your money, Jesse."

"Are you seriously too proud for this? Do you think I give a shit about the money? I barely know what to do with it as it is." Jesse drained his coffee cup. "You're always saying I'm useless and would be nothing without you, why don't you just tell yourself that, if it makes it easier. It's not even a lie."

"Don't talk about yourself that way. And stop being dramatic."

Jesse scowled at him.

"Let's just—walk ourselves through this. Hypothetically, if I took your money, and we were able to convince Skyler and my kids to meet me somewhere Gus didn't know about, and we get to Saul's disappearer…don't you think Gus will realize you helped me?"

"I'm planning on telling him to his face, so yes. He knows where we stand, and you living is part of the deal."

"When you were the one who had gone on the run, and I was left behind to continue working with him, you do remember what happened, right?"

"Why don't we just accept working with him I'm screwed either way, and just focus on you and your people."

"There's still the issue of Hank. I don't know how long this DEA protection is really going to work. Either Gus kills my brother-in-law, or he manages to survive long enough to find the lab and expose Gus's whole operation. Which will, of course, mean that you are exposed along with him."

"That's on you, man. You should've done a better job throwing him off the scent."

"Don't you think I've been trying? I totaled my car keeping him from the laundry. Look, I understand why keeping him alive is probably not a high priority for you—"

"—Just because I think the guy is a total dick, doesn't mean I wanna see him dead."

Walt looked into Jesse's eyes, and saw, in spite of what he would've assumed, that his partner was being sincere. Jesse didn't have a vengeful streak.

"Really. It matters to you?"

"It matters to you," said Jesse, simply. "You'd flip shit if that gimp died. You think I want to deal with that? I'd have to tie you to a tree to keep you from running Gus over with your shitty Aztec."

"It's in the shop," he replied, dryly.

Walt's mouth flattened into a thin line at the mental image.

"In any case…even if we were able to pull that plan off, either Hank will be killed or you will be caught—and if you're not arrested first, Gus will kill you. He'll blame me for this, and he won't want you as a loose end exposing more of his operation than the raid would." Walt shook his head. "No, I can't do that, it's unacceptable."

"Well, what would be acceptable?"

"A plan that keeps my entire family safe," Walter snapped, impatiently.

Jesse set his fork down.

"…Your entire what?"

"Family, obviously! Hank, Skyler, the kids, you. Everybody." Jesse stared at him, as if he'd said some utter profundity and not the obvious—but why should he be surprised, this was Jesse. He had to think, think—there had to be a way to save them and stay out of prison. "No, I was right in my initial assessment. Gus has to die. I realize you have some compunctions about this, but I would like to remind you of what he did to Victor right in front of us. Just picture that every time you have a scruple, Jesse, because I'm definitely going to need your help to do it—"

"—You think of me as family?"

The part of Walter's brain that had been mapping Gus's movements, considering when would be the best moment to strike, flipped off. He stared at Jesse blankly, at a loss for words.

To him it was so clear. He had thought of Jesse as family longer than he had consciously known it himself. The idea, the grouping of priorities—Skyler, the kids, Hank and Marie, Jesse—all of that in the last year had become like a second nature to him. And he even admitted it to Jesse himself, in a moment of weakness and guilt.

"He told me not to give up on family. And I didn't."

Jesse, of course, had no idea that he was referring to him. Apparently he still had no idea.

"Family. You can't give up on them—ever. I mean, what else is there?"

Poor Donald Margolis had lived that credo to the last, in the end. But he hadn't been wrong. The things that Walter had done for and to Jesse…were the sorts of things you only did for family. Darkening your soul, piece by piece—that could only be worth it if you were doing it for family.

"The things I've done to earn it…the things I've had to do. I've got to live with them."

"You really are an idiot sometimes."

It was a feeble dodge at best. Jesse didn't see through it completely—but he saw enough of the truth to jam in his proverbial foot in the door.

"What, am I just supposed to know that? How? You're not exactly Mr. 'Talks about his feelings' guy."

He met Jesse's eye, and he saw that this was not just a statement of fact—his partner was expecting a corrective.

It shouldn't have been a big deal, especially since Walt still considered his life as forfeit. Hell, if it was really the end, honesty should have been his first priority, but for some reason admitting this to Jesse Pinkman felt like handing an enemy a weapon. Displaying a chink in his armor for the world to see.

"Let's just say that I didn't —" He lowered his voice. "—Take care of those two gangbangers simply because I enjoy your sparkling personality."

"Really? You don't?"

He was smiling. The little shithead was smiling.

"Really—I don't. In fact, I don't even particularly like you. You've been a pain in my ass since you walked into my fourth period chemistry class eight years ago."

"Nine."

"Nine, whatever. You are a walking, talking spanner in the works, more or less. Exhibit A—this afternoon. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?"

"I think so." Jesse tilted his head and squinted. "Tell me, are you this big of a douchebag to everybody in your family, or am I just the lucky one?"

He kept his expression neutral, but Walt knew that he did, understand. He understood far too well.

Jesse's phone began to ring on the table in front of them. He picked it up and looked at the number.

"Who is it? Is it Gus?" Jesse didn't reply. "Are you going to pick it up? Remember, no mention of being with me, reassure him, make sure he believes you are on his side—"

"Yo, it's me." There was a pause, Walter mouthed the words "Who is it?" at his partner. He expected Jesse to at least do him a courtesy of mouthing back an answer, but the kid didn't extend him that courtesy. He ignored him, focusing on whoever was on the other line. "Yeah, I did. Yeah…yeah. It was just like you said."

"Is it Gus?"

Jesse shook his head.

"Saul?"

"At Denny's…I was hungry. We're brainstorming. You know, coming up with a plan, of course. I don't know, it was the closest restaurant…I'm figuring that part out, hence the brainstorming." Jesse rolled his eyes. "He's sitting right across from me right now. I'm looking at him. Okay, fine—"

He held the open flip phone out to Walter.

"It's your wife, do you want to talk to her? Reassure her you're alive? Because I know that thing about sending the text was bullshit."

Walter looked at the cell phone as if it had been coated in ricin. He mouthed the word 'no' and made a series of slashing gestures at his neck. His partner attempted to forcibly push the cell phone into his hands, to which Walter stood up in the booth and lifted his hands into the air as if Jesse were holding him at gunpoint.

Rolling his eyes further, Jesse put his ear back to the receiver.

"Yeah, he won't take it. Well, I'm not lying…I don't know, I guess he's afraid I'm going to think he's whipped if he talks to you in front of me, which is pretty dumb, because I already know that for a fact…how are things at your dickhead brother-in-law's, by the way?… Dickhead, yeah. What do you expect me to call him? The dude put me in the hospital. For something that was your asshole husband's idea, by the way! And you're welcome for not suing his ass—"

Walt snatched the cell phone away.

"Skyler? Skyler, honey—"

"—Walt? Is that you?"

She sounded frantic.

"Yes. It's me. Are you and the kids alright? Did you make it to Hank's okay? And how is he?"

"Yes. We're—we're all fine, Walt."

He closed his eyes with relief. It was something.

"Good—that's very good. I'm glad." Walt tried to keep his voice light, the casual, reassuring tone that he had cultivated after many months of lying to her. "Look, honey, I'm in the middle of something here, so—"

Jesse made a vulgar hand gesture.

"—I can call you back later, I promise as soon as I can I will—"

His wife started to cry, the sound of her attempt to stifle it audible over the phone.

"Are you really okay? You're not—hurt or anything?"

"Of course not." Walt's voice softened with concern and genuine puzzlement. "I am…why would I be hurt?"

"I don't know, Walt. Why did you go up into the mountains with a gun I didn't even know you owned and leave behind a goodbye note in our house? Can you explain that to me?"

He squeezed his eyes shut. There would be no getting out of this one, but hell if he wouldn't try.

"I just needed to be alone somewhere peaceful to…think."

"With a gun? How long have you owned a gun, Walter?"

"Look, I don't know what Saul told you, but it's—it's not what you think."

"You left a note. What were you planning on doing?"

"Look, it doesn't matter."

"How am I supposed to believe that? Believe you?"

"I don't have it anymore." He glared across the table. "Your little hired interventionist threw it into the river."

Jesse leaned back in the booth, like an insouciant cat licking cream from a bowl.

"Really. So, if you gave the phone back to him, he would confirm that?"

"Excuse me?"

"Give the phone back to him. I want to ask him."

His fingers tightened around his cell.

"I'm not giving the phone back to Jesse. There's nothing you need to say to him. And I have no doubt he has said more than enough to you."

"I don't trust that you're telling me the truth. And do not try to argue I have no reason for feeling that way."

"Do you think you can trust him? Over me, your own husband?"

"Are you saying he'll lie to me for you?"

He glanced at Jesse. In different circumstances, yes, he could very easily imagine that. Right now, brimming with confidence and the energy that eating syrup soaked tepid bread could only bring to a 25-year-old, he did not think managing what Jesse said to his wife would be the easiest of tasks.

Jesse tried to snatch back the phone. Walter scooted down the bench, and used both feet to repel him under the table.

"By the way, is what he just said about Hank true? Are you the one who had someone call and tell him that Marie was in the hospital?"

He glare daggers at Jesse across the table. Look what you've done now.

"I had no choice. Jesse and I were in the RV. Hank was on the other side of the door, three feet away from me, waiting for a warrant so he could break down the door, and I knew there was nothing else that could get him to leave. I certainly didn't expect him to do that to Jesse."

"That's your priority in this situation?"

"You didn't see his face! I didn't think Hank was capable of that—" He tried to lower his voice, as if Jesse couldn't hear him from across the table. "—And you will recall you came to the condo and asked me—asked me to deal with it, which I did. I'm free, Hank still has a job, Jesse is—"

Now living under threat of death from a twisted chicken restauranteur turned drug kingpin, thanks to me bringing him back into the business, traumatized from killing Gale—

"—Fine. Relatively speaking. As much as he ever is. I cannot believe you let him borrow your car, by the way. I hope you're not counting on it to come back in one piece —"

A sharp jab to the kneecap sent the phone skittering onto the table top.

"Yo, Mrs. White—it's me again." He raised his voice over the sound of Walt's cursing. "Yeah, yeah, that was true…floating downstream, I guess…I don't know, but he can't anymore. Not completely, but now…yes, it's bad."

There was a longer pause now—whatever Skyler said to him, Jesse's heart—the one he wore on his sleeve so often—moved him.

"I'm not gonna let anything happen, like I told you. And I—look, I just wanna say—I know it's none of my business or anything, but—for what it's worth, I know he feels bad about everything."

Walt heard the indistinct chatter of his wife, presumably, laying into Jesse for the sheer impudence of this claim.

"He sucks at admitting it, but he does. You remember that long weekend when you dropped him off at the airport?…Yeah, he was—okay, you figured that—right. Well, like, I don't know if he ever told you, but we almost died that weekend. The battery of the RV died and we had no water, and we were like—fifteen miles from anything. I really thought we were done for, for awhile. So we're lying in the Crystal Ship, dying from heatstroke, and he just starts talking about how he deserves this, for all the shit he's done—mostly for lying to you. It's guilt city, man. I thought it was kind of pathetic, and I had to snap him out of it or we really would have died, but looking back…maybe moments like that, when you think it might be the end, is uh, when you admit how it really is. You feel me?"

Jesse held up his hand, but Walt stopped trying to get the cell back from him. He wondered what it was that Skyler was saying to his partner.

"I've heard him say before that he wishes he had dropped dead before you found out about all this, that it would be better that way for your family. And I don't know, I'm not married, but it just seems like life's too short, and you wouldn't have preferred…less time. But maybe, I don't know, he needs to hear that from you…"

Walter stopped trying to take the phone away.

"I'm not saying you're not justified, you know, in feeling the way you do. I just think that…maybe it would be better if you blamed me for some of it. Since you don't know me at all, and some of it is my fault, that might make you feel better. Look, I'm gonna hang up my phone, but he's going to call you back on his, okay?… All right, have a good night, Mrs. White. We'll let you know when we're heading home."

He shut his phone and stuck it in his pocket. Walter stared at him.

Jesse pulled the salvaged pack of cigarettes out of his inner pocket.

"One left." He got up and slid out of the booth. "I'm gonna go for a smoke. You can call her back and say whatever you want to say in private. Or be a coward and don't, whatever floats your boat."

"There might be another pack in the glove compartment." He lifted his eyes and met Jesse's. "Skyler picked it up again."

He patted Walt on the shoulder, a careless, familiar gesture. Walter found it both intrusive and comforting in the same moment.

He watched through the window of the Denny's as Jesse leaned against Skyler's Wagoneer. His partner carelessly lit up a cigarette, and then Walter turned away, looked back towards the inside of the restaurant. The dinner rush had gone, and there was only one older woman within his sight line, sitting at the counter next to a burly man who was probably the driver of the semi in the lot.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket and pressed the name.

She picked up after three rings.

"…Honey? It's me." Nothing. "You should go somewhere we can really talk."

He heard her padding down the hall of Hank and Marie's house and into another room. It was probably the bathroom.

"Skyler—"

"—You really didn't want the chemo to work, did you?"

It took him a moment to calibrate his mind to that particular line of questioning.

"It's…not that I didn't want it to work. It's that I didn't think it would. I didn't calculate for it or operate under the assumption that—I would have more time than a few months. Skyler, I never meant you to find out about—any of this. I'm sorry you did."

"I know you are. But I'm not. The lies were the worst part for me, Walt…you've never understood that."

Maybe he hadn't. Or maybe he just thought everything else was at least as bad as the lies—the truth, worst of all.

"Do you know what it feels like to have to go to a stranger for the truth about your own husband?"

"No. I can't imagine."

"I hope you realize how pathetic it is that the burnout stoner has made a better case for you than you have for yourself."

His pride stun, but the inherent humor of it also had an effect.

"Given the circumstances, this will sound absurd, but relatively speaking, at least… Jesse is a good kid."

"'A good kid'? That's how you describe your partner in the drug business?"

"Yes. Questionable judgement aside, his—heart is in the right place."

"Really. Well, if only the same could be said for you."

It hurt, to hear the truth. But there was also a small part of him that heard the crack of a door in those words, and in the expression of them—some infinitesimal softening. Perhaps not all was lost.

"So what happens now?"

"Do you remember when you asked me how long it was going to take me to work this out?" She whispered that she did. "This is me—working it out, Skyler. This is what that…looks like."

He resisted the urge to remind her this was what she wanted.

"…In a Denny's?"

"It wasn't my first choice. I didn't even want to eat, actually. I'm staring at a plate of stone cold eggs as we speak, again—not my choice."

"When was the last time you ate, Walt?"

There it was, that old familiar nagging sound in her voice. For so many years, it made him feel emasculated, less than. Now all he cared about was that she cared.

"Yesterday, I think? Jesse asked me the same question. I really can't remember."

"Maybe that's a sign, and you should eat the eggs. It might help with your brainstorming exercise. Unless you'd rather smoke a joint with your 'weed dealer.'"

"The sarcasm is not necessary. I will eat something, okay?" He's shoveled the unappetizing eggs into his mouth. "I'm doing it right now. I'm eating. Nourishment is entering the body."

"Good."

Even though it was unappetizing, it actually did make him feel a little better.

"When was the last time you ate?"

"Marie made us lasagna for dinner. What are the chances of you actually coming up with a plan?"

"Not very high. On my own I had very few options, with Jesse to bounce ideas off—there are a few more possibilities."

"That's your brain trust?"

"Yes. Believe it or not, he's—better about this sort of thing than you'd think. I mean, he's come through in situations like this before."

"Situations where your life is in danger?"

He squinted at the floor.

"…Yes."

She sat with that for a minute.

"Have you considered…turning yourself in?"

"Skyler—at this point I'm not sure that option is even going to be a sure protection for you and the kids—"

"—If there is no other way, Walt. If you can't come up with another solution to this, and police protection is the only thing we can do…will you turn yourself in?"

She sounded so calm, so sanguine compared to that last, desperate look they'd shared before she drove away.

"Yes. Yes, of course I will."

He told her that he loved her and hung up the phone. As he stared at it, some small weight left his shoulders.

He realized that he actually meant it.

He was curious about what brand Mrs. White smoked, and so he decided to check. Marlboro lights. Classic. She was a classic looking lady, so it fit.

There was the faint smell of tobacco in the aged fabric. She must've smoked them in the car. He stared out over the lonely stretch of highway in front of him and tried to picture Mr. White's wife smoking in this car. Somehow the image didn't jive with the bossy ball-and-chain giving him shit for selling her nerd of a husband weed.

If only that had been what he was doing.

When his phone rang, it didn't occur to him till do anything but stay in the car.

"Hello?"

"Where are you right now?"

The icy voice of Gustavo Fring still had the ability to send a chill up Jesse's spine, even after walking six miles to the border with the dude half-dead from poison right next to him.

"In a parking lot, just had dinner." He lit up a cigarette. "So I guess you got my message."

"You make yourself difficult to ignore." Jesse took a drag. "I believe I have been reasonable. I am a businessman—and I allow no one to dictate to me how I conduct my business."

"I think I'm reasonable, too. I haven't asked for a lot from you. Just one thing, as far as I can remember. You do that, we're cool. Until I know for a fact that you've done that, I'm calling in sick from work."

"I have honored your request. I have done nothing to your former partner."

"Then where the hell is he? He's not at his house, or his condo. His car is not there. This morning you made it out like he was just skipping work, but that's not really what happened, is it?"

There was an eerie silence on the other end of the line.

"He came to see me last night, you know. Or maybe you don't—but I have a feeling you do."

"I took your advice, and terminated his employment at the laundry. You should not take me honoring your wishes lightly."

"That's all you did? Fired him?"

"And less than twelve hours later, the DEA comes to our place of business. You see the danger of loose ends."

"Bullshit. If Mr. White had rolled on us, they'd already be knocking down your door. He hasn't told anyone jack shit. He'd have to rat on himself, and he would rather be dead than his son find out, anyway."

"Perhaps Walter has left the city, then."

"Without his family? The dude would not just leave behind his wife and kids."

"I agree. I never suggested he didn't take them with him. Walter is a man who loves his family above all else. I would never question his devotion to them."

Jesse realized that Gus was waiting for him to admit he knew the Whites were with Schrader. He could've found that out from Saul, of course, but he didn't want to draw attention to the unscrupulous lawyer, or what Mrs. White might know about her husband and their operation, so he said nothing. Gus waited for a moment, then, when no admission was forthcoming, continued.

"I can only tell you what I have done and what I know. I have done nothing to Walter, and I do not know where he is. You may consider that his disappearance is meant to appear to you as if I have broken my promise."

"He wants me to think he's dead, huh? So, what happens then? I'm so royally pissed off I turn on you, and he pops back to life like a zombie after I—what, kill you for him? I'm supposed to believe Mr. White thinks I'm going to do something that stupid."

"I doubt Walter knows how you would behave if you believed I was responsible for something...final. I myself am not sure. That is why I have allowed him to live as long as I have against my own better judgment." Gus's voice turned cold. "I don't like unpredictable elements."

It was funny that Gus and Mr. White both thought he was such a loose cannon, so unpredictable. Jesse knew exactly what he'd do if the man on the other end of the phone broke his promise.

Whatever it took to take him down.

"I know, it's why you never wanted to work with me."

"It's why I had misgivings about working with Walter. I believed he showed poor judgment in having you as his partner."

Yeah, thought Jesse, who could ever trust a no good junkie, after all?

"Now I see that you have perhaps been even more unwise in choosing him."

"I didn't choose him! I never wanted to work with him, I don't even like the guy. It's like I said, he's the world's biggest asshole."

"I know. Walter does not respect you as you deserve. He treats you with condescension. Your loyalty he takes for granted. But perhaps he has cause for that. You have given it to him so freely, after all."

Nothing in life was free, Jesse thought. Certainly not his loyalty. Everything wrong in his life he could trace back to that moment, and yet, within all that pain—the constant was pain—there was another constant, too.

"Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

Mr. White, who sometimes seemed to care more about Jesse's life than he himself did. He would never be whole again, never be fixed all the way—he had accepted that. Sometimes it felt like he and Mr. White were broken pieces of two different plates, all mixed up together, jagged edges that didn't fit, held together with the glue of blood, hydrofluoric acid and guilt.

"The first time we met, I asked Walter why he chooses to do business with you. Do you know what he said?"

Jesse's grip tightened on the phone. He really didn't. Jesse honestly couldn't imagine Mr. White defending that choice to someone like Gus—not when he was that desperate for cash.

"He told me and it's because you do what he says."

Gus paused, and Jesse knew that he thought this was a cause of great offense to him, the nail in the coffin of their supremely fucked up partnership. Jesse started to laugh.

"Do you find that amusing?"

"A little. It's more like…such a fucking him thing to say."

What a colossal asshole.

"You don't think it's true?"

He could hear that slight edge of accusation, which was always so delicate from Gus, not at all like Mr. White's rambling, biting strings of insults. When Gus was calling you an idiot, he didn't do it in so many words.

Was it true?

You killed Gale because he told you to. That has been part of it. He had wrestled for so long with his guilt over that act, but sometimes, when he woke up in the middle of the night, he entertained the thought of how he would feel if he had not done it.

It was a worse feeling. He was selfish, no good, because even though Mr. White's death would not have been at his hand, he would have felt just as responsible for it. He would've known that Mr. White's family could never know the truth, Mrs. White might guess at it, but he couldn't tell her anything, because that would put her in danger, and that's the last thing her uptight science teacher husband would've wanted. And even if he went on the run and managed to allude Gus, Jesse would be haunted by what he imagined it had been like. His partner's final moments in the lab, alone, waiting for help that would never come.

Killing Gale had broken something inside of him, but the alternative…it would have shattered him to pieces.

I'm not doing what he wants right now. In fact, I'm doing the exact opposite. I wasn't doing what he wanted this afternoon, to the point where that selfish asshole was practically begging me to let him die. But I wouldn't.

The thought of him and Mr. White having a wrestling match over that stupid gun bolstered his courage. Compared to that jackass, Gus was nothing.

"Did he give you any other reasons?"

"One other."

Jesse waited.

"Aren't you gonna tell me? Or are you that afraid of making him look good?"

"He said that he could trust you."

It was such a small thing, not one that should have caused this strange stirring in the pit of his stomach, this feeling of pride. No shit Mr. White could trust him. He had earned that trust with blood—so many times. So often his partner had made it out as if he didn't trust Jesse, belittled him, had made him feel like he was somebody who needed to be managed and looked after.

Mike said that Gus saw something in him. Loyalty. "Maybe you got it for the wrong guy."

That was probably true. His former chemistry teacher was no good for him. But just because Mr. White was the wrong guy didn't make Gus the right one.

"Can you settle an argument for me?" Gus agreed. "When those two guys came after me and Mike…was that a set up?"

"Why would you ask me that?"

"Mr. White said it was. He seemed to think you wanted me to feel like a big shot, a valued member of the team. I thought he was being a massive prick about it at the time. Like, you know—how he always is. I mean, he literally said 'this is all about me.'"

One thing he did appreciate about Gustavo Fring…there was a lot less rambling bullshit and a lot more telling pauses.

"…Right."

Of course that asshole was right. Well, eff him, Jesse was certainly not going to him. The dude already thought the universe revolved around him.

"So I guess we better talk about my conditions. That is why you called, right?"

There is a dangerously long pause on the phone.

"What is it you want?"

"You're giving me control of the lab. The way I figure it, I should be able to choose my own assistant."

"Absolutely not."

"I'm not stepping foot in that lab again without Mr. White. That's my condition. Take it or leave it."

It was a lot easier to be this brave when he was not looking into Gus's cold eyes, when he was pretty sure that no way Gus knew where he was. But he also had a sense of confidence. They needed him. Mr. White would be dead already, if they didn't.

Gus at least pretended to think about it.

"Even if I were to allow it, you know Walter would never agree to work under your authority. He is an immensely proud man."

"If it's a choice between that, and his entire family getting wasted, I think he'll swallow it."

"Are you so sure?"

Jesse's lip twitched into an involuntary grimace. Gus made a solid case. It was a good thing he really didn't expect this to work.

"Look, convincing him is my problem, not yours. He's not gonna try anything. All those cameras in the lab, plus I'll be watching him. He has cancer, he'll be dead in a year anyway. Just let him ride out the clock."

"I trust you to manage Walter even less than I trusted him to manage you."

"First sign of trouble, you can fire him. The permanent way that you've always wanted."

"And if I'm compelled to do so? You will work with me? We will have peace?"

Funny how all that time spent with Mr. White, and Jesse still did not have his amazing ability to lie and bullshit through his teeth when it really counted.

"It's a pity," said Gus, finally. "I believe you and Walter are both capable of being reasonable. I could've done business with either one of you—separately." His voice dropped. "Together you are far more trouble than you're worth."

He couldn't think of someone whose personality was less like Gus's than Saul, but it made him think of the lawyer all the same. It was the kind of shit he said all the time, though not in so many words. "I'm your lawyer, not Maury Povich!"

"You started with just him. You could always go back to that. You only need one of us, and you have a better shot of making that work than getting me to change my mind."

"We both know that's not true."

There was a strange pang in his chest. If Gus believed it, and he was willing to say it… I mean, there is nothing to be gained by lying about Mr. White giving a shit about him.

"May I speak to Walter?"

An alarm bell went off, and Jesse's head. Danger, danger.

"You delete his phone number that quick?"

"I wish to discuss this arrangement with him. It would be simplest if you just handed the phone to him. Once I am sure he agrees to my terms, I will speak to you again."

"Yo, he's not with me."

Jesse glanced at the empty seat next to him. Not technically a lie.

"If that's true," said Fring. "You most certainly know where to find him. You know that your partner is safe, wherever he is. If you had truly believed there was a chance I had broken my word, you would not have this degree of composure."

That was probably true. Gus knew enough about Jesse to understand that when it came to people he cared about, he didn't exactly hold back.

"Let's just say I could pass a message along for you. That's the best I can do."

"His brother-in-law's life is forfeit. There is no negotiating this point. He is a threat to our entire operation, and he will be dealt with."

Fair enough. They could hardly expect better. This was Gus, after all. Coming from the guy who had slit Victor's throat with a box cutter right front in front of them, this was practically an ice cream sundae.

"I get that. I'm not stupid, man. I'll sweeten the deal for you. I'll take care of Schrader myself."

The plan emerged fully formed in his brain as he spoke the words. He could tell from Gus's composed silence he was even impressed by it. Jesse himself did not know where it came from, except, perhaps, that proximity to Mr. White had given him some diabolical superhuman power, like radiation from a nuke or a spider bite.

"Aren't you worried about Walter discovering this?"

"I won't let him. Just—think about it."

Gus hung up the phone. Jesse wondered if he would think about it, or just proceed with whatever plan he had to take Schrader out himself. Probably that last line had been a bit too much. Still, worth a try.

One door shut…wasn't there an expression about windows opening up when that happened?

He shoved Mrs. White's Marlboro lights back in the glove compartment, got out of the car and shut the door of the Wagoneer behind him.

He looked back at the Denny's. Through the window, Jesse could clearly see the booth where he and Mr. White had been eating.

The table was empty.

His chest suddenly seized up—an involuntary fear response.

His legs moved faster than his brain, he was in the restaurant, in front of the booth. No jacket, no cell phone, both plates cleared away. No sign of a check or money. Jesse gripped the keys and the gun in his jacket tightly with his fist. Calm down. Calm down.

He had only taken his eyes off that son of a bitch for ten minutes.

When the waitress came by, Jesse turned on her, trying to force his voice to remain calm.

"Um, did you—did you see where the guy at the table went?" She stared at him. "The guy I was eating with, did you see where he went?"

She shook her head, no, honey, and Jesse had seen that look enough times to know that he seemed fucking nuts right now.

He tried to force himself to think logically, like Mr. White would in a situation like this, instead of his way, which was to panic.

He had a cell phone, but no car. No way had a cab come already, he would've seen it driving down the road, and Jesse wasn't even sure they did come all the way up here.

"You got a back door?"

"Through the kitchen, sweetheart. What are you—"

Jesse barged through the swinging doors of the Denny's kitchen before she could finish the sentence. He demanded the lone fry cook on duty tell him whether he had seen a bald middle-aged dude running past. The kid, who looked even younger than Jesse himself, told him in no uncertain terms to get the fuck out, a sentiment echoed by the waitress, who yanked him out of the kitchen with more force than he would've given her credit for. Not that Jesse was fighting her all that hard, not once he'd realized that Mr. White really hadn't gone out that way. His whole body had gone limp.

"Is there anything around here?" He couldn't have gotten that far on foot, and maybe if Jesse had a direction to go in— "Like a gas station, or a—a bus stop, maybe—"

The bathroom door behind her swung open, and Mr. White stepped through it. He was wiping his hand with a paper towel and when he noticed his partner harassing the waitress. As if on cue, Walt gave his protege one of his confused, what-are-you-doing-now-Jesse looks.

"Jesse." Mr. White nodded at the table. "Did you pay?"

He felt his knees involuntarily buckle. He had to grip the table to stay upright.

"W-what?" Jesse croaked.

"The check, Jesse," Walt said, impatiently. "Did you pay for our food? Or do you need another pile of processed carbohydrates soaked in corn syrup to get you through the night?"

Jesse looked at him—this mean-spirited, cruel bastard, with his shaved head and nerdy glasses, waiting with that patented look of exasperated impatience for him to answer the damn question, and he did the only thing that made sense in that moment—the sort of thing that didn't make sense at all, least of all to him, but nobody who had met Jesse Pinkman would ever accuse him of doing things that made sense, anyway.

He wrapped his arms around his old high school chemistry teacher and squeezed.

Jesse felt Mr. White stiffen and murmur a deeply embarrassed apology to the waitress, but the words were indistinct over the sounds of his own muffled sobs. Then there was an awkward pat on the back—a fleeting, familiar sensation—which turned into a brief brush of the hand on the back of Jesse's head. There was always hesitation and brittleness in these gestures between them, as if his partner thought he was made of glass and would crack if he pulled him any closer.

Then Jesse felt himself being guided back to the table, and gently extricated from Mr. White's arms. He pushed him in and slid next to Jesse in the booth.

"Jesse…what is wrong with you?"

It was a question Walter White had asked him many times, in various tones of disbelief, rage, indignation, disappointment, exasperation. Jesse had never heard the question posed so gently.

"I just," he sniffed. "You weren't here when I got back, and I thought…"

"That I had taken off like Harrison Ford in 'The Fugitive'?"

"Shut up! You've done crazier shit than that. Like, in the last week."

Jesse stared down at the table, try to wipe away his tears with the edge of his sweatshirt sleeve. He could feel Mr. White watching him. It was a strange feeling when Mr. White watched him, like being a spider in a glass jar.

"I'm not going anywhere, Jesse," Walt said, finally.

"How come?" Jesse asked, feeling childish, very young, when Mr. White was staring at him with that strangely wistful, far away look that he had seen on his face a handful of times, usually when he was speaking about his family or regrets. He never looked at Jesse Pinkman like that. Never before today.

"Because I have nowhere else to go. No one else to turn to." he said it's a bluntly, so matter-of-factly, like one of those chemistry equations he'd never been able to master, no matter how often Mr. White told him to apply himself. "I'm putting myself entirely in your hands."

The waitress chose that moment to bring over the check.

"Will that be it for you boys?"

She was polite, but he could hear her voice that she would be grateful to see the back of them. That was nothing new. Most people wanted to see the back of Jesse Pinkman and Walter White.

"Jesse?" His partner nudged him. "Jesse."

"What?"

"The bill." He lowered his voice to a hiss. "I already told you I don't have any money. I need you to pay."

He started to laugh, a laugh which quickly turned into a suppressed sob. Jesse pulled a fifty out of his wallet and laid it on the table.

"I didn't realize this was what you meant."

Jesse waited until they were back in the car to tell Mr. White he had gotten him his old job back. He decided against telling him that the new arrangement would have him in charge of the lab, because as funny as his reaction to that would've been, nothing was set in stone. They might not have much time left before the clock ran out, and he didn't want to waste it on a pointless argument.

"How on earth did you convince him to do that?"

"I promised Gus I'd get Schrader for him." His partner started to protest, but Jesse cut him off. "Chill, will you? I just told him that. I needed to give him something to buy us some time. I even came up with a plan."

"To kill my brother-in-law? For Gus."

"Hypothetically, yo." Jesse started up the car. "Want to hear it?"

"Why would I want to hear your plot to kill Hank?"

"Cause you never pass up the chance to tell me my ideas suck."

Walt rolled his eyes.

"My opinion obviously means a lot to you, so fine. I will humor you—tell me your plan."

"I call him, and I tell him the truth." Mr. White snorted. "Seriously. I tell him he's right about Gus, that we called the DEA, that me and my partner Heisenberg are Fring's cooks, and we're being held hostage and my partner's family is being threatened. In exchange for witness protection, we'll flip on him."

"How exactly is this supposed to be a plan to kill my brother-in-law?"

"Easy. I tell Schrader that he has to come meet us somewhere private. I tell Gus I'm going to lure him to an isolated spot and off him, and I'll make it look like the cartel did it to take the heat off him."

"Why on earth would Hank trust you?"

"He's got a hard on for catching you, and I am his only connection to Heisenberg. He knows Gus sells your product, right?"

"This is the most ridiculous—he is under DEA protective custody. You have never met Marie. She's not going to let him out of her sight. Certainly not for something which is so obviously a trap. I hope you didn't actually pitch this idea to Gus."

"You didn't wait for the best part." he pulled Walt's cellphone out of his pocket and held it up to his face. "I tell him if he doesn't do as I say, he'll never see his brother-in-law again. And I call from this."

Walt stared at him.

"Don't you get it? You're my hostage, yo." Jesse tossed the phone into the air—Walt snatched it back. "If calling from your cell phone doesn't work, I think you should say something over the phone to him—some whiny, crybaby 'he's got a gun on me' bullshit."

Mr. White gave him a look of flabbergasted disbelief. Jesse savored it—that brief window of not getting an answer back. It didn't last, of course.

"Alright, I've heard you out." He gave one of his uptight, rigid hand gestures around the face, like they were still in chemistry class, and he was giving one of his stick-up-his-ass after hours lectures. "First of all, Gus knows I would never agree to this plan, and the only way you could maybe sell it is with my cooperation. Second of all, even if I did agree to help, Hank would never come alone to meet you anywhere."

"Not even if it means the difference between his beloved brother-in-law Walter getting his head blown off or not?"

He looked appalled.

"That is just—sick, Jesse. I don't know where you are getting these twisted ideas."

"This from the dude who got the guy to leave a junkyard by telling him his wife was in a car accident."

Walt sighed, too tired to argue the point. He felt like he was back in the desert, close to death, and the only thing cajoling him from keeling over was Jesse screeching in his ear.

"You're just jealous you didn't think of it first. You've got way more of a criminal mind than me, yo."

Walter opened his mouth to argue—then he spotted the expression, somewhere between defiance and Jesse bursting out laughing. How long had it been since he'd seen a genuine smile on Jesse's face?

"I suppose I have—" His own lip twitched. "Not been the best influence."

They started to drive back down the mountain. The lights of the city flickered in the distance. Jesse drove responsibly, for once, and there was a few minutes of almost peaceful silence between them.

"You call your wife back?" Walt nodded. "Everything okay?"

"I told her if we couldn't come up with a plan that I would turn myself in." He paused. "I guess I should've consulted with you before I agreed to that."

"So you meant it? You weren't…lying?"

"Yes, Jesse. I meant it."

"Relax. We still got time to come up with a plan. Remember when we were out in the desert and almost dead to rights? You pulled a battery out of your ass and some spare change."

"Only because you yelled at me to do that or—build a robot."

Jesse turned down a street that Walter didn't recognize. They certainly weren't heading to Jesse's house, or to Saul's office, a safe house he could imagine or any part of town he expected.

"Hey, maybe we can build a robot to protect your asshole brother-in-law."

"Very amusing. Where are you taking me, exactly?"

"I just thought of the perfect spot. No one will be looking for us there. Plus…you still owe me a raincheck."

"A raincheck? For what?"

"Go karts, yo. If tonight's our last night of freedom, I'm cashing that shit in."

"You're not serious."

"I'm renting the whole place out and we're racing."

"I am not—"

Walt caught sight of Jesse's face and stopped himself.

"All right, Jesse—alright. You win." He thought about it. Maybe it was the last night. He didn't have the energy to fight the boy on something so trivial, anyway. "One race."

"For real?"

"One."

Jesse's face lit up like a Christmas tree.

"Oh, it's on, bitch."

There was still time to think of something, Walt reasoned, turning ideas over in his head, allowing his partner to bask in one of his rare concessions to Jesse's desires. Jesse, like all great students, could motivate one with the sheer force of his enthusiasm and faith. Jesse was the only person left in his life who had any faith in him, now. He had to trust in that. They were partners, after all.

And he always did his best planning when he was driving anyway.