A wet day in early Autumn, warm but not too hot, in many ways the perfect day to be out of the office chasing idiots. Raylan adjusted the straps on his vest, drawing the Velcro a little tighter, this was a new vest and he hadn't quite got it perfect yet.

"Try not to get shot again."

Raylan touched the brim of his hat with his forefinger and arched his eyebrows, declining to answer Tim's smartass remark.

Gutterson's grin was of the shit-eating variety, and his blue eyes twinkled with mischief. Raylan fought the urge to smile, and lost.

"Very funny." He wrinkled his nose a little. "Right, are we going to do this or not.'

Tim pulled his ball cap on, peak forwards shielding the rain from his face a little. "Front and centre."

Some days Raylan really wondered if Tim realised exactly what all this military-style shit did for Raylan. He genuinely loved talking about Tim's skills to the idiots they encountered. Okay, so it was a code between them for when Tim would pull the trigger, but it didn't seem to matter to Raylan's soul. Tim was the bomb, and Raylan knew it.

It was curious, the caring, he wasn't sure when Tim had gone from office junior, good in support to being the guy that Raylan knew he could depend on for anything, to close and trusted friend. The stages of their relationship seemed all mixed up together.

He pulled himself together. Jeremiah Williams, 57, evil old bastard and all round asshole in violation of his court mandated tether. Raylan and Tim were there to take him back to court, and then probably jail.

That Art had sent the two of them bothered Raylan a little. Made him wary, although there was nothing actually in the file that suggested anything particularly dangerous about the man.

They put their vests on out of habit.

Raylan headed up to the front door of the cabin, uncomfortably aware of how far they were from anything that could be reasonably called civilization. If something went wrong out here they were on their own for a long time.

Shit. He tried to shake off the feeling, it was crazy. One old man.

He knocked. Heard someone moving around. "Jeremiah, you in there? United States Marshals."

"G'away."

Great.

Raylan would probably be the first to admit that he had a short fuse, but this guy was lighting the blue touch paper early.

The cabin door swung open.

Raylan was way too old and experienced to fall for that one. "Jeremiah, I'm Deputy US Marshal Raylan Givens, and this is Deputy Tim Gutterson and we're here to take you back to court. Now we can do this the easy way, or the hard way, but I am sincerely hoping that you will see sense and not make it hard…"

"RAYLAN!"

Raylan looked back up at Tim's warning shout, but his partner was shoving him out of the way, as a sack came flying through the air. Raylan stumbled, righted himself, spun and drew down in the space of seconds, saw the content of the sack impact Tim's outstretched left arm and fall.

Tim cried out in pain. Snake! Raylan fired once and it was dead.

It was so damn fast. Tim standing there, holding his arm stiffly stretched out in front of him, staring at the snake on the ground.

"Tim?"

"It bit me." Tim's voice was quiet, but Raylan could hear the strain in the words as his childhood experiences and training kicked in.

He grabbed the sack and picked up the snake by the tail, avoiding the head, dumped the snake in the bag, and stepped up to put an arm around Tim. "You need to keep your arm lower than your heart, can you do that for me buddy?" He could feel Tim beginning to shake with reaction and hear the hitch in his breathing. Pain, respiratory distress… shit.

The bite area was already showing signs of swelling, and Raylan took a second to evaluate as he slowly coaxed his shivering partner back to the car. Big snake, that was good, the younger the snake the more vicious the bite, the snake had struck Tim's arm a glancing blow so with luck the envenomation would have been mild, and it was the thicker, fleshier, muscled mass of Tim's forearm, not his hand which would have been worse.

Raylan was taking any plus points he could get as he coaxed his partner into the car.

Tim needed hospital treatment, and Jeremiah could wait, Raylan would call it in when he had gotten Tim to medical attention. He crouched down next to his partner, "Tim, let's get you comfortable, we've got a ways to go, and I need to do a couple of things before we leave."

Bewildered pain-filled blue eyes met his, the trust that Raylan could read in their depths made him want to howl like a coyote. "I can't give you anything for the pain." I'm sorry, I know how much it hurts… bad memory that one.

He re-focused on his partner, stripping away the Velcro straps that held Tim's vest on, getting him comfortable, reclining the seat, guidelines said that he should splint the bitten arm loosely and Raylan dug through the medical kit in the trunk, picked up the blanket he kept there and climbed into the driver's seat.

Willed his hands to stop shaking as he used the supplies from the medical kit to gently immobilize Tim's arm, and then covered him with the blanket.

Tim was pale, his breathing was distressed and he was still shivering a little, but the trust in his eyes was unwavering as Raylan drove.

The summer he was twelve, the summer he could have died if it hadn't been for Becky's mother. Arlo hadn't even wanted to call a doctor. But Becky's mother had picked him up, and put him in her car, and driven all the way to the hospital at a breakneck speed.

He didn't remember much, just the pain, and the feeling that he couldn't breathe and how cold he was on a hot summer's day, and Becky's mother gently stroking his hair back and talking to him in a low, soothing calm voice. The rest of it was just a jumble.

But that was the summer Raylan's father had beaten him less often. And Raylan didn't know if it was because the snake had bitten him, or because Becky's mother seemed to be watching them, watching the way Arlo treated his son. And he didn't know whether he should be happy or sad, because he knew that this could not last forever, and once he was alone with Arlo it would be bad again.

If he closed his eyes and concentrated real hard he could feel the gentle hands lovingly stroking his hair and the low calm voice telling him he was a good brave boy, and how good it all felt, and how much it made him want to cry, because it was never like that at home.

So he kept up the low, soothing talk to Tim, not that Tim wasn't the most laid-back, nonchalant little bastard on the planet, but because Raylan was scared and the memory of that one time he felt tenderness had gotten him through the pain and he didn't want Tim to feel that pain.

Tim Gutterson had been wounded in action, he had had a lousy violent father who had beaten the crap out of him. He thought he knew pain.

Nothing prepared him for this. His arm was numb and tingling, his hand had swelled a little, all of that was worrying, but the pain was relentless. Even though he couldn't move his arm, and Raylan had done his best to immobilize the limb and make him comfortable the pain did not seem to depend on movement. It radiated out from the bite site like fire on a fuse.

Tim closed his eyes and forced his focus away from the pain and the numbness and the tingling, and concentrated on Raylan's voice. Gentle, kind, soothing, he needed to hear what Raylan was saying.

It was strange and slightly jumbled up, but Raylan seemed to be telling him about when he was bitten by a copperhead when he was a child. Tim hung on then to every word. The mystery of Raylan Givens was being revealed, a mystery that Tim realized he really did want to get to the bottom of.

"…talk to me."

Tim frowned, refocused and realized that Raylan was talking to him now and needed a response. He rallied. "Becky's mom…" he slurred a little, wondering when his speech had become affected, "right?"

Then Raylan's hand was reaching for his good hand, and Tim's fingers wrapped around Raylan's like they were meant to hold hands, and there was nothing weird about it as Raylan's touch was chasing the pain away.

"Yeah, Becky's mom saved my life." Raylan said softly. "For what?" Tim almost didn't catch that Raylan's voice was so quiet.

There it was. The key, the way Raylan had been ever since he came back from suspension. Tim had known that something was seriously off. Far worse than after he had been shot. And here Tim was, flat on his back, nerves screaming in agony, not entirely clear of his own monsters and…

The car jolted.

Tim screamed as his own jolt of pure agony ripped through his body and his fingers convulsed gripping Raylan's hand hard enough to bruise.

"Tim. Stay with me, Tim." Raylan's voice low and soothing, and Tim tried to relax his grip on Raylan's hand.

"Hurts like the devil." He forced himself to relax.

"Nearly there. I promise you, Tim. Only a few more minutes and then there's gonna be something for the pain. I promise."

Something broken in Raylan's voice and Tim knew he had to fix it. He fixed Raylan before, he could fix him again. They all needed Raylan. He needed Raylan. Examining exactly why he needed Raylan was something that he was going to have to leave for another time, when he felt less sick and dizzy.

Time had expanded and contracted and Tim had well and truly lost track of it, but Raylan was pulling into the emergency bay of a hospital, yelling for help, and time seemed to speed up.

Tim was carefully lifted from the car, onto a gurney, and Raylan was right there with him, carrying a sack that Tim was vaguely certain he recognized, then they were somewhere with bright lights and a big steel tray, and Raylan upended the sack and something heavy flopped out.

Copperhead, said Tim's brain. Tim's eyes sought Raylan's, "I've been bit." He said, completely unnecessarily. But something flipped off and on in Raylan's expression, and there was a slightly shaky laugh, and the cowboy swiped a trembling hand across his face.

[][][][][][][][]

"Deputy Gutterson was lucky, very mild bite under the circumstances. He's still in quite a lot of discomfort, but we're managing the pain quite successfully, and the other symptoms are easing. If there are no complications, he will be out of here in a week with no ill effects."

Art stared solemnly at his two deputies. Raylan hunched up in one of those hideously uncomfortable chairs, next to Tim's bed. "Thanks, doctor." He turned to smile at the man.

"Deputy Givens has a mild case of shock," the doctor continued, "we were forced to give him a little something to calm him down. I would prefer he stays overnight in slightly more formal circumstances, but he insists he is fine and since he plans on staying with Deputy Gutterson, we can keep him under observation."

Art sighed, he didn't have the full story, so it was all too easy to feel some irritation at Raylan's behaviour, but shock said that something wasn't right. If he thought about it, Raylan had been off since coming back from his suspension.

He thanked the doctor again, and pushed the door to their room open.

It was only when he got closer that he realized that Raylan was asleep, head on his folded right arm, his other hand loosely clasped around Tim's right hand. Tim was watching him.

Art didn't want to disturb them, but he needed to know they were alright. He moved a little closer, and Tim looked up.

"Boss?" Tim's usual drawl was thicker and slower than usual, Art walked up to the bed then.

"How y'feeling?" he said quietly.

"Not great." The reply was slow, and there was a far off look in Tim's eyes which Art put down to pain and medication and the stress of being bitten. "Arm hurts." He muttered.

"Feel up to telling me what happened?"

Tim gave Art a funny little smile and shifted a bit, a frown crossed Raylan's sleeping face, his hand tightened slightly around Tim's hand. Tim turned his head, and Art saw the fond look in his eyes.

"Jeremiah had a nasty surprise for us. Raylan wasn't actually looking at him at the time, I was, it was sheer dumb bad luck." He licked his lips a little. Art picked up the cup of water and held it so that Tim could get a drink.

Tim nodded his thanks, looking down at his sleeping partner again. "He took it badly."

Art could hear the wealth of meaning even in Tim's slurred, sleepy tone. It occurred to him that Tim himself had been struggling with the aftermath of the Drew Thompson case.

"What about you, Tim?"

Art wasn't surprised when a frown settled on Tim's face, the younger man shook his head slightly, "I was surprised."

"Surprised?" Art really wasn't getting it.

"Rhodes was different." Tim shook his head again, "I don't know why."

Art could see that Tim was fading, and his youngest marshal had been through a hellish experience, "I should let you get some sleep."

Tim nodded blearily, Art waved a hand at Raylan, who hadn't moved an inch, "what about him?"

Just for a second, Tim's cunning little smile peeked out. "They were going to wait until he dropped off before putting him to bed." That fond look was back in Tim's eyes, even as his lids drooped lower.

Art sighed, and shook his head ruefully. Gently patting Tim on the shoulder he turned to go. Let them take care of each other, they understood each other, so maybe they could help each other too.

Tim's eyes closed, and he gave Raylan's hand a tiny squeeze. After a moment the lean fingers squeezed back. Tim fell asleep with a smile on his face. They were in it together. He was not alone and that meant a lot.