Disclaimer : I don't own them. Not trying to make any money out of this fiction. So please don't sue me.

The Last Run

Summary : This is the story of what exactly happened between Luke returning from the war & Bo graduating from high school and the start of the tv show.

The sun wasn't even up yet when Luke Duke's feet hit the cold hardwood floor; heck the sun wasn't even going think about coming up for another couple of hours. Luke had some time and his stomach told him he needed some food. Being careful not to wake his cousin or anyone else in the family for that matter, it was way too early for even farmers to be up, Luke made his way into the kitchen.

Entering the kitchen, a smile spread across his face as he saw the playing cards still scattered out on the kitchen table where they had left them last night. It had been a quite night, and the Dukes don't see many of them. Bo had went out on a date and as such was out late with the General. It being a week night, Luke had to work late helping Uncle Jesse finish up an order for the weekend. And while Luke was sure the gathering Bo went to was filled with great music and dancing, he was just feeling like a night in.

After helping Daisy with cleaning up the kitchen from dinner, Daisy and Luke had convinced Uncle Jesse to play them in a game of rummy. Well one game quickly turned into two, which turned into three before Luke and Daisy had experienced enough losing for one night. Don't you know it, Uncle Jesse, the old goat, had won every single game by at least a hundred points.

Well a quite night at the Duke farm generally makes for an early bed time, and the pain in his stomach told him he had been foolish not to eat a little something right before bed. Turning on the oven, Luke sliced of a piece of the bread Daisy had baked last weekend and slid it in the oven to warm. By the time he fixed himself a tall glass of water, Luke was removing his bread from the oven. He didn't really want to toast it, just to get it warm; the way it was when Daisy baked it fresh on Sundays. Now some of you out there might be wondering why Luke didn't bother with any butter. Well that there is homemade bread and homemade bread is practically half butter already. It is also extremely crumbly, which explains why Luke took it out on the porch to eat it.

Standing out on porch in the early morning hours, Luke carefully stood on the edge eating his slice of bread. He knew well what Uncle Jesse would do if he found him eating before the livestock. Luke chuckled & shook his head at the memory of that day nearly a year ago when he had just returned from the war. . . .

It was spring, Bo was finishing up high school – set to graduate in about 2 weeks. It had been a morning similar to this one. Luke had woken up hungry from not eating anything hours before going to bed the night before. Without thinking, Luke made a bee line for the kitchen; he was up with plenty of time to eat a little something before starting his morning chores and he was hungry.

Luke was laying a piece of toast on his plate and next to his scrambled eggs, when Uncle Jesse walked into the kitchen.

"Luke you up early. Fixing breakfast. Finished with your morning chores." Jesse wasn't a stupid man he had picked his words carefully. At the mention of morning chores, Luke knew he had screwed up. The most basic rule of living on a farm: the animals always got taken care of first. On a farm where they are your livelihood, where they can make the difference whether you make it through the winter comfortably with plenty of food, or just barely getting by with having to ration out the portions so you can make it to spring. Bottom line was that the animals got feed first. Having lived on the Duke farm for almost his entire life, Luke knew this and Uncle Jesse knew Luke had momentarily forgotten it. "Get and don't come back in 'till your finished!" Jesse commanded pointing at the door.

"Yes, sir." Luke replied already on his way out the door with head bowed.

A little time later Bo joined Luke out in the barn to help change out the straw in the horse stalls. "You finish feeding the rabbits?" Bo asked as he ran down his mental checklist making sure everything was finished.

"Yeah. Did you take care of milking the cows?" Luke seeing the end of the morning chores, was doing the same thing as Bo.

"Yeah. Uncle Jesse got the eggs and feed the chickens. Anything else that needs to be done this morning, Luke?"

As if on cue, Luke's stomach rumbled. "Eat. We will need to change the straw in the cow stalls tonight, but I think we are done for the morning. Let's go get some breakfast before you head off to school and I go plow the hay field."

Walking into the kitchen, Bo and Luke were greeted with the smell of fried bacon, eggs, biscuits, red-eye gravy, and coffee. Uncle Jesse and Daisy were already seated at the table just waiting on the boys. Meals were always an enjoyable experience in the Duke house filled with friendly banter and talk of what the day would (or did) entail. Nothing was mentioned about Luke's mishap earlier; it was like it had never occurred. Bo caught the bus, Daisy left for work at the Boar's Nest, and Uncle Jesse had some mending work he needed to do on the barn, and Luke headed out to plow the hay field.

It wasn't until mid-day that Luke realized that even though nothing was mentioned at the breakfast table, Uncle Jesse had not forgotten. You see when lunch time came all Luke had in his brown paper sack was some bread and a Mason jar of water. Taking a deep breath and smiling a little bit, Luke couldn't help but think 'Boy does Uncle Jesse know how to drive a point home.'

Well it had worked, since that day Luke never forgot to finish his morning chores before coming inside to fix or eat breakfast. Although there still were times like this morning when he needed just a little something to get him through his morning chores and while he knew Uncle Jesse would not get upset at him having a piece of toast before starting work, it was more a principle sort of thing now.

Dusting off his hands, Luke headed to the barn. Based on the position of the moon, Luke figured there was about an hour and a half before day break. Meaning the rest of the family would be up within the half hour and if Luke could get his chores finished, he could be fixing breakfast just as the other Dukes finish up their chores.