The spark from Jason's lips on hers barely registered in Ellie's brain as she pushed herself away, heart pounding and breaths coming in short gasps, her eyes wide. She scuttled back a few feet, pulling her knees up to her chest, focusing intently on the straw broom leaning against the stall door opposite her while heat spread up from her neck, burning her cheeks.

Holy shit…What the hell just happened? Ellie counted her inhales and exhales in an effort to control her breathing.

A long sigh escaped through Jason's nose, and Ellie caught him unravelling his long legs in her peripheral vision. His boots scraping against the concrete floor weren't unlike nails on a chalkboard, unbearably loud in the thick silence that stretched much further than the few feet between them.

For one panicked moment, Ellie thought he was going to approach her again, but when she actually turned her head, he strode right past her. He completely ignored her, he didn't even spare her a glance as he undid the latch on Pixie's stall, slinging the halter and lead rope hanging on a nearby hook over his inked up shoulder.

Ellie saw boots and black horse hooves cross her field of vision a moment later, the latter sending vibrations through the floor and up her spine. Ellie shivered along with them, the heat on her face flash-freezing from the cold that seemed to emanate from Jason. She hastily made her leave before he could return from the paddocks out back and freeze her to her core.

Nobody was home to hear her stomp up the stairs in Tommy and Maria's cottage and slam her bedroom door. Sometime during the past week she had moved into the room beside Joel's, and she was still getting used to having her own bed. It was colder and lonelier sleeping separated from him, but she figured her survival didn't depend upon sleeping near Joel anymore.

Ellie moodily plopped herself on the bed, grabbing one of her Savage Starlight comics from the unruly pile on her nightstand. She barely scanned the pages, unable to concentrate on anything but her racing heart and the brush of Jason's lips against hers. She finally gave up with a frustrated groan, tossing the tattered comic at the dull, beige wall.

She pulled her knees to her chest, resting her chin on her kneecaps so she could glare at her brass doorknob. What the fuck's wrong with me? He didn't even kiss you, stupid! Why are you freaking out over it? She wished she could stop the blush from creeping up her neck.

Ellie sighed loudly, flopping on her back to stare at the ceiling instead.

Her staring contest continued until the quiet of the house blanketed her, gentle and tranquil, making her eyelids grow heavy as she fell into a light nap.


Ellie gradually awoke, the wispy images of Jason from her dreams falling away like dusty cobwebs. Even in my sleep he won't leave me alone…she groaned.

Sitting upright at the sound of the screen door clapping shut downstairs, Ellie tuned in to Maria and Dr. Anderson's urgent voices floating up from the kitchen, shattering the peaceful silence of the house with their arguing.

Ellie was glad for the distraction. She tiptoed to the top landing of the staircase, her shadow accompanying her wherever the rectangles of deep orange sunlight framed it on the wall.

She carefully sat down on the top step, praying the wood beneath her feet wouldn't groan and betray her presence, listening.

"So what do you suppose we do then? Dominic's getting worse," that was Maria, and judging by the strain in her voice, her stress levels must have been through the roof.

Ellie could imagine Dr. Anderson with both hands on the table, leaning heavily on it. "As I said, we're doing the best we can," he sounded like he had difficulty keeping his tone neutral.

"So you think he has botulism?" Maria queried in a worried voice.

There was a short silence, and then Dr. Anderson replied, "It's very likely. No deep tendon reflex, breathing difficulties…It's only a matter of time before paralysis sets in. I'm sure the boys out there in the field tried their best to keep the wound clean, but you know how messy gunshot and stab wounds can be." He paused for a moment, as if to ponder something. Then, "The bullet or the sword could've easily come in contact with the bacteria from soil, grimy floors…Who knows how far the bacteria's spread in his body? Even doctors aren't perfect, there could have been something we missed when Dominic came in."

"You think he's gonna pull through?" Maria asked.

Ellie heard the table creak as slow, methodical footsteps sent faint vibrations through the wooden stairs. "If we can perform surgery again to get contaminated tissue out, it should help. I can see if we have any antitoxin. If not…well, he'll be bedridden for weeks anyway," Dr. Anderson said, his tone grim.

They were both silent for a long time, long enough to make Ellie think that was the end of the conversation. But then Maria's quieter, more tired voice floated up the staircase, "If Dominic survives, what then? What are we going to do with him?"

"That's something for you and Tommy to discuss. You cross that bridge when you come to it," the doctor advised sagely.

"But that's the problem. We have no idea where he came from. We could be making a mistake, what if someone tried to kill him for a reason? I saw his jacket, I know what Cobras were capable of in Denver. Istill remember what they were capable of, and back then they didn't have anywhere near as much power as Tommy said they did a few years ago," some of the stress crept back into Maria's voice.

The image of Dominic's photo flashed across Ellie's mind's eye, and a small spike of hope came with it. She descended the stairs, the soft creaking announcing her presence. Maria and Dr. Anderson picked their heads up, giving her strained smiles.

"Sorry if we disturbed you, Ellie, we didn't think anyone was home yet," Maria apologized.

Ellie casually shrugged, hiding the fact that she had been eavesdropping with ease. "It's okay. Are you guys talking about Dominic?"

Dr. Anderson nodded, his mouth set in a grim line. "Yes…he's having some complications after surgery."

Ellie chewed her lip in thought, fidgeting a bit. Maria cocked her head asking, "Got something on your mind, Ellie?"

Ellie snapped her head up, meeting Maria's eyes for a second before casting her gaze downward again. "Yeah…I found a picture that Dominic had. Jason has a matching one, and I was just thinking, you know, that Jason might know him. He said he had a friend in the Cobras," she explained, and Maria narrowed her eyes at Ellie.

"You were snooping through Dominic's things?" Maria asked disapprovingly, in that way that meant she already knew the answer.

Dr. Anderson placed a hand on Maria's shoulder, diverting her attention before she could give Ellie a lecture, "We'll talk about that later. You talk to Jason, I have to get back to the infirmary." Maria nodded in agreement, and she and Ellie headed to the barn as the sun disappeared behind the trees in the West.

Upon arrival, they found Jason forking hay down from the loft. He nodded to his visitors, his gaze passing over Ellie. Maria made a 'come here' motion at him, and Jason shot them a suspicious glance, which turned to an icy glare directed at Ellie. He rested the pitchfork against a tower of hay bales, hopping with ease from the hayloft's edge. Ellie and Maria visibly flinched as he landed on one knee, and the latter looked like she wanted to scold him for giving her a mini heart attack.

"Jason," Maria began after she took a moment to recover, "we have a couple of questions for you."

Jason crossed his arms, the black ink of his military tattoo glittering under the barn's lights. He lifted one eyebrow, encouraging her to continue.

Maria pursed her lips, taking a moment to decide how best to explain the situation to him. "We…have reason to believe one of your old Cobra friends has turned up in our infirmary this morning. Did you ever work with a guy named Dominic?"

Jason almost immediately shook his head, dispelling any hope that dared to rise within Ellie. "Nope, doesn't ring any bells," he replied, his tone laced with enough irritation to indicate he didn't want to be bothered.

"You sure?" Maria's eyebrows drew together as if she wasn't convinced, "He's got the same tattoo as you, same squad number and everything."

Jason hesitated for a moment, enough to convince Ellie that he wasn't being entirely honest, too. Or maybe he was just being more of an asshole than usual to get them off his back, she couldn't tell which. "I told you, I don't know anybody by that name," he snapped, quickly collecting himself, "Now if you'd excuse me, I have hungry horses to feed." As if to reinforce his words, Pixie nickered impatiently from a nearby stall.

"But he has the same picture of you and Riley, you have to know him!" Ellie interjected before Jason could stride off.

Jason froze, keeping a wary eye on Ellie. "He has a picture of me and Riley?" he repeated, all hostility gone from his voice. Ellie nodded vigorously in reply. Jason's lips formed a hard line as if to keep a particular memory at bay. "What's his full name?" he queried, lifting an eyebrow in genuine interest.

Ellie gave Maria a look, and she pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to recall the memory. "Uh…damn, what was it? Oh!" she snapped her fingers, "Dominic Ian Rowland, that's it."

Jason's eyes went wide as dinner plates, his jaw falling slightly open. He quickly composed himself, pushing past the pair as he broke into a jog, making a beeline for the infirmary. Ellie and Maria exchanged relieved smiles, the former patting Ellie on the head with a "Good job". They ran to catch up with Jason.

When they arrived at the infirmary, they almost collided with him as he unexpectedly skidded to a halt just inside the doors. Jason threw a curious glance at Dominic, hesitantly stepping over to him like he wasn't sure he had the right person. His eyes flicked between Dominic's face and the tattoo on his upper right arm, his brows drawing together at his mismatched memories.

Dominic, on the other hand, stared listlessly up at the wooden rafters, unresponsive to the commotion by the entrance. It was like he was completely consumed by his own exhaustion, and couldn't focus on anything else.

"Isn't that the guy you remember?" Ellie asked, hoping the puzzle pieces would all fit together.

From the uncertain look on Jason's face, she knew some pieces were still missing. "Yeah, but…Ian was blond, and he had blue eyes."

"So it's not him?" Maria said with a hint of disappointment.

Jason smirked, his gaze resting on Ian's tattoo, "It's him. I guess we were both guilty of wearing disguises." He strode over to Ian's bedside, pulling up a chair. Maria rushed over to Dr. Anderson, and they both disappeared into the operating room.

"Hey, Cobra. Long time, no see, eh?" Jason frowned, resting his elbows on the edge of the mattress. Ellie took a seat on the bed behind him, feeling her stomach twist at the languid look in Dominic's eyes.

Dominic took a ragged breath, just barely managing a tiny smile of recognition as he rested his dulled gaze on Jason. "Ponyboy…so you're alive," he slurred after a few moments, his voice but a raspy whisper.

"You won't be if you keep up like this. What the hell happened to you?" Jason queried.

"I was…bested by a rat…and the King of Dragons…" Dominic explained vaguely with a few coughs. His eyes remained dim and unfocused, as if a fog had blanketed his mind and made it difficult to formulate coherent thoughts, let alone speak.

Jason and Ellie simultaneously cocked their heads at his cryptic riddle, but while Ellie had reason to believe he was delirious, Jason puzzled over it for a few moments like what Dominic was saying actually made sense.

Jason's expression grew dark as the realization dawned on him. "Jerry stabbed you with Bahamut? Shit, you've lost your touch since Denver…" he tried to make light of the situation, but his smirk was more like a frown. Dominic rolled his eyes.

"How the hell did you get that from 'rat' and 'King of Dragons'?" Ellie asked incredulously from behind Jason. He promptly ignored her.

"I…kept my promise. Riley's safe…she misses you," Ian smiled weakly at Jason's look of pure relief and gratitude, wincing a bit as Jason clasped his hand, resting his forehead on his knuckles like he was thanking a higher power. "Now that…you're here…my job's done," Ian's smile faded, and Jason took a moment to fit two and two together.

He dropped Ian's hand, instead grabbing his neck like he was going to choke him. Ellie reached out to stop him, afraid he would hurt Ian, but Ian waved her off, his eyes focused on Jason's dead-serious glare. "You're not gonna fucking do that to Riley, you're not giving up just because you've found me. I bet she's sitting somewhere, worried sick about you, and you just wanna die on her?" Jason forced Ian to look at him, making his grip tight enough only to let him know he wasn't kidding around.

Ian blinked at him, as if coming to his senses for a moment. "Sorry…can't think straight," a laboured breath escaped his lips. He reached into the back pocket of his jeans, pulling a chain out with difficulty.

Ian dangled it in tauntingly in front of Jason, the two gold rings on it glinting in the artificial light from above their heads. Ellie noticed they were both splotched with dried blood.

"Plus, if I died…wouldn't be able to…give Riley one of these," Ian drawled, coughing a few times from the strain talking was putting on his body. Ian smirked, smugly amused by the way Jason's jaw hit the floor.

It took him a moment to compose himself, but even when he did, Jason sputtered dumbly, "You-you've gotta be joking…"

"You think I woulda…gone to the trouble of getting these…if I was joking?" Ian lifted an eyebrow.

Jason let out something between an angry hiss and a snarl, getting up so fast that he would have hit Ellie's legs with his chair if she hadn't pulled them up in time. "Fuck you, Cobra," Jason spat viciously at Ian, shoving the infirmary door open with unnecessary force upon exit. Ellie stared after him with a mixture of mild surprise and disbelief.

"So…not friends?" Ellie snorted after a minute, and Ian smirked feebly, wincing as he put the chain back in his pocket.

"Not exactly…Ponyboy's just mad I'm making a move before he is," Ian rolled his eyes, glancing at the operating room doors as they swung open. Dr. Anderson, Maria, and a mouse-haired nurse emerged with grave looks on their faces.

They halted in front of Ian's cot. Dr. Anderson gave him a nod of greeting, clearing his throat. "We're going to have to perform surgery on you again, Dominic. We have reason to believe you might be developing a disease called botulism, and we need to remove any contaminated tissue to keep it from getting worse," he explained formally, and Dominic nodded.

"Sounds good, Doc. Promise I won't flatline this time," Dominic feebly smirked, but the three adults didn't share his crude sense of humor.


It was twilight by the time Ellie reached the barn, having been sent away by Maria before Dominic was taken in for surgery again. The barn lights attracted her like the moths and mosquitos clamoring around the towering floodlights positioned around Jackson.

A sense of anxiety pervaded Ellie's mind as she slipped into the barn. Jason was unpredictable and unstable when he was stressed or angry, and after his outburst in the infirmary, Ellie was pretty sure that he was both. It didn't help that he had tried to kiss her, either.

But the barn was oddly quiet; Jason wasn't hacking away at his barrel dummy in the middle of the aisle like he usually was at night. Instead the soft swishing of horse tails and gentle snorts greeted her. Somewhat relieved, Ellie was about to turn around and head back to Tommy's when a faint orange glow caught her eye beyond the barn's partially open back door.

Curious, Ellie tiptoed over and poked her head out to investigate. The paddocks were always dark since no floodlights had been erected around the barn. She made out Jason's silhouette on the corral's high fence against the sun's fading red light, and the orange glow igniting around his lips again before quickly fizzling out. A puff of white-gray smoke dissipated into the air.

Taking a deep breath to steel herself against Jason's expected wrath, Ellie conspicuously stepped toward the corral fence, making her presence known behind him. The day's heat was only beginning to surrender to the night's chill, but the humidity stubbornly refused to give in. Ellie tucked a damp strand of hair behind her ear as she clambered up onto the fence.

Jason was half-turned away from her, but the gentle night breeze still wafted the acrid, foul-smelling cigarette smoke into her face. Ellie wrinkled her nose, wiping at her watering eyes. "You smoke?" she blurted out the obvious, more to express her dislike of the smoke in her face than anything.

Jason shrugged, tapping the ash from his cigarette. It disappeared into the dark, hard-packed dirt of the corral. "Sometimes. You want one?" he offered her a fresh cigarette from his back pocket, his voice surprisingly bereft of the anger Ellie had expected.

"I don't smoke," Ellie replied.

The silence that settled between them wasn't uncomfortable, but rather peaceful. The crickets were beginning their concert in the tall grass lining the paddock fences, filling the quiet for them.

"Are you still mad at Dominic?" Ellie queried, watching Jason's shoulders tense at the name.

After taking a final drag on his cigarette, Jason snuffed it out on the fence's rough wooden surface, flicking it into the dark abyss below them. "I feel kinda stupid, actually. How could I think Riley wouldn't move on after she was convinced I was dead? I guess that was just me being selfish…"

"So Dominic got Riley to fall in love with him after they left?" Ellie cocked her head.

"No, Riley had fallen for him long before they escaped from Denver. Eventually she chose me over him, but you can guess what happened after I was out of the picture," Jason spat bitterly.

Ellie fell quiet for a moment, thinking back to the golden rings Dominic had so proudly presented in front of Jason. "Do you think he's really going to do it? Marry Riley, I mean?"

Jason took a deep breath, his spidery finger tightly gripping the denim at his knees. "Knowing him, yeah. God, it makes me want to throw up."

"Why? Do you want to be the one popping the question?" Ellie chuckled as Jason hunched his shoulders, trying to hide the blush she could see creeping up his face in the half-light of twilight.

Jason gently kicked at the corral fence, with the same motion he would be using to scuff the barn floor. "I dunno…if I was older, I would think about it," he mumbled shyly.

Another short silence settled between them, and Ellie sensed a bit more awkwardness, like she was stepping into territory she shouldn't. "So what about you?" Jason broke the quiet, his tone genuinely curious, "I told you who I lost, now it's your turn to spill."

Ellie chewed her lip, fidgeting as the painful memories crept into her mind. "Her name was Riley too…she was my best friend," she began, taking pauses to collect herself. "We used to hang out at this abandoned mall back in Boston, and then Riley joined the Fireflies," Ellie quietly explained, focusing intently on the place where she knew her bite mark was.

"Was that how she died?" Jason ventured, but Ellie shook her head.

"No…" Ellie trailed off, and Jason waited patiently for her to continue, "We were goofing off in the mall, and Infected came after us…she got bit."

Jason's lips formed a grim line, and he let a soft sigh escape his nose. He nodded sympathetically. "I'm sorry."

"Thanks…" Ellie said half-heartedly, eyeing the faint scars around Jason's left shoulder and collarbone to distract herself. "How did you get those?"

Jason lifted an eyebrow, glancing at said scars. He chuckled lightly at the memory, but Ellie could still hear the pain it brought him. "These? I fell through a plate glass window escaping a warehouse fire with Riley. Broke my ankle, too," he shrugged nonchalantly.

"Oh…did a lot of crazy stuff like that happen in Denver?" Ellie asked.

"Sure," Jason smirked, "besides tiffs between the Fireflies and the military, I've been in jail, survived an air raid outside the Zone, almost been killed by Ian a bunch of times, and almost committed suicide. How's that for a track record?"

An unpermitted snort of laughter escaped Ellie's lips, and Jason's smirk widened just a fraction. "I don't think I can beat that…" Ellie fought a smile, but it eventually won and quirked the edges of her mouth upwards.

"C'mon, I gotta close up the barn," Jason nudged Ellie with his elbow.

The awkwardness gone between them, he hopped off the corral's fence with her, slinging a friendly arm around her shoulders as they took their time strolling back to the barn, exchanging near-death experiences as they tried to top each other's tales.


A/N: Ooh, love triangle drama! Because this isn't modern television, I'm only going to go a teensy bit reality-show on you guys, just because it's so darn fun :) Don't be surprised if there are some Downton Abbey themes thrown in later on, either...Yes, I have tons of drama up my sleeves for later. Thanks for reading and reviewing, and as always, stay tuned!