A/N: Now we get Jesse's POV in the aftermath of 7.02 "Forget Me Not" and on through 7.03 "Down Range." I'm making the required announcement that I don't own "Friends Will Be Friends" by Queen, but you knew that whatever song I picked, it would include the angelic vocals of Freddie M for Jesse.

Now I know almost everyone is looking for the Michael-Fiona chapters. But I think occasionally we need to get the other character's POV and some things just require an explanation IMVHO, like how the hell did Maddie get custody of Charlie so fast and whatever happened to Ruth Westen, which will be covered in the next chapter. But fear not, the next several chapters will be all about our fav dysfunctional couple.

"Friends Will Be Friends"

"Michael and Fiona love each other and they hate each other, but it's always each other."

Except it wasn't…

Stealing a surreptitious look at the couple in the backseat in the rear view mirror, Madeline Westen's words to him a few years ago about her son and his girlfriend had taken on a totally ironic edge.

Because right now there was someone else sitting in the back seat with Fiona Glenanne.

"I belong out there with him for better or worse."

But it hadn't ended like that…

He and Sam hadn't been really thrilled with what Mike had done, but friends that they were, they'd figured their bearded buddy at least deserved a few quiet minutes to say something to Fiona without her latest lover sticking his nose in it. Therefore they had gone to run interference when Carlos had returned with the car he'd left to retrieve, Mr. Axe's new Beamer, so they could all go home finally.

The tall bald man sighed and tried to keep his eyes on the road ahead instead of peering at the relatively unfamiliar pairing behind him and definitely attempted without much success to stop his thoughts from straying to how the hell they'd all ended up here, uncomfortably gathered in a silently charged vehicle.

"Well, at least the hard part's over, Fi."

"Yea, I wish I could believe that."

While they'd been sitting in that van, doing surveillance outside the hospital where they'd left Sam and waiting to tail Olivia Riley back to her new cartel partners, unfortunately she had been right and he had been very wrong… losing their evidence, a hellacious firefight, three weeks in CIA custody and then…

No, there was nothing easy about what was going on now, certainly not for the dark haired man he thought of as a brother. He and the ex-SEAL had watched from a distance while they'd kept Fiona's current beau occupied as the redhead had given the former love of her life the shadow of an embrace with a brush along the cheek, a cursory thank you, and then had strode off. They had both winced.

"I have a life now. I have a new house, a new business, a new man."

"I totally feel you, Fi."

But he hadn't… not really… but what else could he say? Jesse didn't have to be a CIFA-trained analyst to see that she was still hurting. The tall bald man couldn't help but be reminded of what had happened when they'd all been released from that CIA black prison every time he looked at the petite ex-guerrilla.

Her reaction to whatever Mike was telling her, that strangled 'no' that was audible even from the distance they were being held part. Then Fiona running from Mike, tearing through that unfortunate agent who was stupid enough to get in her way like a Class 5 hurricane and finally the incoherent wild woman that Sam had finally been able to talk down long enough to get her to come with them before she burned rubber out of the parking lot in the Caddy. She had disappeared for months thereafter.

With the leader of Team Westen apparently back in and everyone else heading off in their own direction after they'd regained their freedom, Mr. Porter had bunked with his other mother for a while, making sure the hard smoking blonde was settled before he had taken some time off to head up to Atlanta and reconnect with some people from his past. He'd come back from his time in Georgia to the news the Irishwoman was not only back, but was no longer a solo act and it wasn't because Mike had returned.

"Did I miss something? You guys don't tell me anything, seriously."

Not that Jesse was around to see much of Ms Glenanne these days, or since he'd resumed residence in Miami for that matter, and that had been both deliberate and necessary on his part.

He stole another furtive glance at the pair in the backseat. The guy was a mess… swollen cheek, bloody nose, black eyes forming, thumb in an ice pack. Sr. Cruz probably needed to go have either his nose or his thumb reset, maybe both, but the irate redhead had insisted on going home, so to home they went.

"Well, you charge the bull, you get the horns…" Sam had remarked sagely as they had stood back and watched while her Latin lover, against their protestations and advice to the contrary, had decided to go give Michael a piece of his mind and Carlos had gotten his ass handed to him in a few short moves.

"Mike looks like hell," he had remarked to his other friend as they had watched the reinstated spy climb reluctantly into the back of the SRT van with his new handler and drive away. It actually hurt to watch…

They had gone none too quickly to pick the younger man up off the pavement and assess his injuries. Jesse had left the former Navy man with the medical training to handle that part and he'd gone back for the car because Mr. Porter hadn't wanted any part of being there once Fiona had magically re-appeared.

"Well, that was the most awkward car ride in the history of car rides," he declared once they had left the duo at what had once been Calvin Schmidt's residence and was now their new permanent address.

"Yeah," Sam agreed with a sigh. "Just glad I don't have to be there for the rest of it."

Jesse was certain that the charged silence which had permeated the vehicle for their entire return trip would be ending as soon as the two of them were inside the front door.

"Well, let's go get your ride, Kemmo Sabe. We got lots of work to do."

"Work? What'cha talkin' about, white man? Wasn't almost getting fragged by a Claymore enough for you for one day? You wanna risk Sandino territory again?"

"Think about it for a minute, will ya?" Mr. Axe requested. "Who else has the equipment, the man power and the need to impress the hell outta his new boss to get all those damned CIA bugs outta the hotel? You're gonna be buying me mojitos for a month off this commission."

"Ohhhh," he replied. "Ohhhhhh..."

"Damned straight, Skippy, and now I'm gonna have to move Elsa's birthday bash out to the yacht too."

"Cuz the last thing you need is Big Mama finding out you guys were making a sex tape for the CIA this morning," the younger man guessed as they rounded the corner out of Fiona's neighborhood.

"Yeah, something like that," Sam grumbled. "If Mikey weren't in so damned far over his head right now, I'd have given him a right hook for that one too!"

"I feel ya, brother," he agreed, remembering the haunted looking ghost who'd climbed out of the black Crown Vic that had almost gotten them killed trying to keep them from almost getting killed while being used as bait by the Agency. "I wonder what Carlos said to Mike that got him-"

"Trust me, Jess, we are better off not knowing," the older man assured him. "Get your gear over to the house on Star Island first. I wanna make sure that's clear before I take Elsa over there tonight."

"Will do," Mr. Porter agreed as they pulled up next to his parked Porsche discretely sitting by the curb. "But how are you gonna keep her outta the office all-"

"That's why I have to move the party to the yacht," the ex-SEAL clarified, annunciating every word as though speaking to a particularly dull CO. "I can't take a chance on her wandering in while you're clearing things out and if you think Elsa'd react badly, I know you will not wanna be there if Fiona finds out who bugged her new place while you're clearing it."

"No, no, no, no, no, that is so not on my to-do list."

"Well, there ya go then, brother. I figure if I get all out on the boat, nobody can sneak back home and catch you doing your exterminator thing," Sam explained.

The younger man nodded. "Pretty smart for a washed up old booze hound," he agreed using the redhead's pet name for the older man.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever, listen, we need to get in front of this thing pronto before Fi finds out. Otherwise, she'll be tracking Mike down wherever the hell he's been hiding and he'll wish he hadda Claymore wired to his front door, you hear me?"

"On it!" Jesse agreed as he slid his lanky frame out of the auto and quickly closed the door behind him.

Settling behind the wheel, he quickly fired up the engine and then sat for a moment, watching the dark Beamer head down the street and trying to order his jumbled thoughts as the voice of Freddy Mercury issued from the high-end sound system.

~~Another red letter day, so the pound has dropped and the children are creating.

The other half ran away, Taking all the cash and leaving you with the lumber.

Got a pain in the chest, doctors on strike, what you need is a rest,

It's not easy, love, but you've got friends you can trust.~~

Jesse sighed. Every time he heard that particular song, there was something else he couldn't not think about, namely the now deceased Nate Westen sitting in his passenger seat complaining about his choice of music after they had just made it to Tallahassee to just under six hours to interrogate Butch McCall about his former cellmate. One piece of a very complicated job: turn Rebecca into an asset by getting a bullseye off her brother, get her to spill on where to find Anson and ultimately free their fav redhead.

He put the car in drive and sighed again. Somehow all that seemed so much simpler than what they were dealing with now. If his loyalties were being stretched, Jesse could only just imagine what Sam was going through being caught between his steadfast support of Michael and his friendship with Fiona…

~~Friends will be friends,

When you're in need of love they give you care and attention.~~

Of course, Sam had never made the mistake of having feelings for the Irishwoman either, except for loathing perhaps, though they were long past that part of their lives. While he would never, no not ever, as the former SEAL had once put it, dream of sitting in another man's canoe, the fact that Ms Glenanne had taken up with another man did have the unfortunate side effect of making him remember things from back then, he'd thought they were long past… no, no, no, no, that they were long past.

~~Friends will be friends,

When you're through with life and all hope is lost,

Hold out your hand cuz friends will be friends right till the end.~~

Mr Porter decided that he was grateful that the CIA had only gotten around to bugging his office at his position with Rovak and not what they'd done to Sam. Sometimes not being Michael Westen's best friend was a blessing. At least, the hacking attack on the company computers had been by an outside source and not something connected with the damned Agency. He could be grateful for that much.

~~Now it's a beautiful day, the postman delivered a letter from your lover,

Only a phone call away, you tried to track him down but somebody stole his number,

As a matter of fact, you're getting used to life without him in your way.~~

But since he'd lost his job with Securicorp, thanks to their last go-round on the run from the U.S. intelligence community, he'd been grateful that Lucy Chen had helped him get new gainful employment. Hopefully whatever the re-reinstated spy was into this time would blow back on his current workplace.

He'd put up with a lot since Mike had burned him, but Jesse knew he also gained a lot as well. As his trip to Atlanta had reminded the tall bald man, he had a family in Miami and he didn't really have one much of anywhere else. His mother's people back in Georgia really weren't his and the temporary family he'd first had in Miami in his youth had been kind but somewhat overwhelmed with their myriad of responsibilities that included a homeless shelter, especially after his foster father had had a major stroke and then passed away. His foster mom hadn't lasted much longer after that and he'd aged out early.

Thinking about Mrs. Milligan brought him back to thinking about Olivia Riley again because the sad fact was the former counter intel legend who'd abused him while he'd been in her clutches unfortunately resembled the lady who'd taken him after he'd been abandoned again, this time by his relative with whom he'd been placed in Dade County after his mom's murder, who'd failed to come back one night.

"But honestly why put yourself through all that for people you just met a few years ago? Look, man, I'm just trying to give you a second chance."

"You know what? Clean slate isn't all that appealing if I have to sell out my friends to get it."

"So you're telling me you want a life sentence over a fresh start?"

"No, that's not what I want, but … looks like that's what I'm gonna get."

Pulling into the parking garage of the downtown security firm, Jesse shook his head to clear it of the memories of not only his past as a younger man but his more recent disappointment with regard to the mystery surrounding what had happened and the lack of results of the homicide investigation into the incident that had left him an orphan. It would be far too easy to get caught up in thinking about it again.

"I'm offering you answers to questions that have haunted you for 25 years. All for the incredibly low price of just one address. But I'm not gonna wait forever for you to do the right thing. So… this offer… it only lasts as long as it takes me to light his cigarette…. So think about what your mom would tell you. Wouldn't she say, 'find the man who killed me, son? Find him'."

"You listen to me. You didn't know my mom. You don't get to speak for my mom. You know what she would have said? 'You never turn your back on family'."

"These people aren't your family, Jesse."

"Yea, they are."

He pounded the leather encased steering wheel with the palm of his hand and growled in frustration. He'd told Fiona that nobody was better than Olivia Riley at hitting where it hurt and he had been very sorry to be right in that moment, though not as unhappy as he'd been after Mike had rescued him.

His throat raw from being gassed, unsteady on his feet as he'd lurched across the room to reach for the file that Reilly had used to try to trick him into betraying his friends, and the bitter irony of blank pages.

~~It's so easy now, cuz you got friends you can trust,
Friends will be friends, when you're in need of love they give you care and attention,
Friends will be friends, when you're through with life and all hope is lost,
Hold out your hand cuz friends will be friends right till the end.~~

Whatever happened next, Jesse thought as he switched off the engine and got out of the highly tuned piece of German engineering, he knew he'd be there to help, like he had promised, if Mike needed him.

()()()()()()

As it turned out, that promise got tested a few days later.

He was playing hoops outside a dumpy little drug den around 11:00 AM waiting for his target to roll up in a yellow Porsche when Sam Axe showed up instead, requesting that Jesse drop what he was doing and accompany the older man on a job in the Dominican Republic to help Mr Westen with something.

"He wasn't very forthcoming with details, but he needs backup."

"Look, Sam, you know I want to help out, but I got clients to answer to, man. I can't just go running off to the DR on a random Thursday."

And yet he had done just exactly that… black flight out of Miami on an hour's notice into the Dominican Republic under fire and needing to blow up the plane in order to cover their asses on the way out.

The more things change, the more they stay the same…

But what had changed was the disgraced spy's apparent disregard for collateral damage on a job. He and Sam had waited until they were back in that nasty hole in the wall where Mike had apparently been living the last nine months to let their friend know exactly how they'd felt about that modification.

"As it happens, I do have a problem shooting random guards," he'd declared as soon as the door shut.

"If we're careful, it won't be necessary."

"What if it is?" Sam had countered. "I mean, I'm the guy with the finger on the trigger."

"What's going on, Mike…? This isn't like you."

And then when that guy they'd dropped everything to come down and help him and Burke steal a heavily armored truck from a very secure compound had finally told them what had really happened when the CIA had set them free all those months ago, he'd found himself wishing he didn't know.

"The deal I made with Strong, it wasn't just to work for the CIA. It was to get close to Burke and take him down…" He'd urged the man to continue. Jesse had long suspected there was more to it than just Mike back in. "Remember that CIA holding facility? If I don't take him down, we all go back there… for good…"

And while he'd spent the night trying to cram his overlarge frame into the dilapidated couch, convinced that the bugs that weren't crawling on his body were munching on his flesh, two thoughts had kept the former CIFA agent from getting any shut eye even more so than the sorry sleeping arrangements.

The first had been that same rough accommodation that his friend had been living… no, surviving… in because if he was already fighting off depression just being here over night, then Jesse could guess how badly his surroundings were affecting Mike. When he'd first seen his friend climbing out of the car once he'd run them off the road back in Miami, the younger man had just assumed the scruff and the sloppy clothes had just been part of his cover. Now he definitely wasn't so sure about that. He'd had to watch people in his government job, see if they were really who they claimed to be, so Jesse knew deep cover could be a bitch. But seeing the effects of it firsthand… The loft had hardly been the Taj Mahal, but it'd had an air of organization and purpose. This place reeked of desperation with a note of delayed despair.

The second was just how much trouble they were all really in… He'd assumed at the time they were being held that once Olivia Riley's dirty deeds, and likely her connection to Card's double dealings, came to light, then they would be freed because it was over and that Mike had made a choice… one he didn't understand fully, but he assumed there was a reason… Mr Porter had mentally chastised himself. He knew better. The seventh floor was gonna sweep everything under the rug, them included. It was only a desperate deal with an equally desperate Andrew Strong that got them out of those 10x10 cells at all.

"For what it's worth, I had orders…"

Unless something had been seriously wrong, which apparently things were, a covert operative of Mr Westen's caliber wouldn't make those kinds of mistakes, never mind doing surveillance on his former team. And if those were the arrangements, then there was no way in hell he and Sam were going back to Miami and leave Mr. 'I made Mike bug his friends' in charge of this operation without their oversight.

Mike had been backed into one helluva corner and they were right in there with him.

~~It's so easy now, cuz you got friends you can trust,
Friends will be friends, when you're in need of love they give you care and attention,
Friends will be friends, when you're through with life and all hope is lost,
Hold out your hand cuz friends will be friends right till the end.~~

And so it had been that Mr Axe had laid down the law to Agent Strong the next morning in that CIA operations center with Mr Porter's steadfast albeit silent support as he'd made it clear he'd agreed.

"There's something you should know about me. When I take a job, I finish it, so we're staying. You want me gone? You arrest me and cart me outta here. "

Damned good thing they had too, because the entire thing had gone to hell in a handbasket in a hot second. The site for meet was all wrong, only one way in and out. Langley's priorities, insisting on getting a recording for the deal between Burke and Rafael Serrano, were also very screwed up in their opinion.

But that was nothing compared to what had really gone sideways. Because the stolen high tech equipment was just an excuse to draw the other terrorist out of hiding so the people that Burke worked for could question him and that was not the only thing the analysts from the Agency had gotten wrong.

The snipers had been spotted by the helicopter sent to ex-fil Randall Burke and his real target. If Sam hadn't been there to figure out his buddy's play to preserve his cover in time by the SEAL taking a shot at Mike to prove all those hostiles weren't his, the continued cluelessness of the agent allegedly in charge would have certainly gotten their friend killed.

So as the warehouse containing the encryption equipment had exploded and Strong had erupted into a torrent of profanity while getting on the phone with Langley, they had watched the chopper containing the men they'd come to capture fly away with the man they'd come to protect.

"I hate to say it, Sammy, but I think this thing is far from over."

But whatever was going down, whatever would happen, tomorrow or the next day or the day after, Jesse Porter was certain of one thing, no matter what it might cost him, and he was sure it was likely to cost something in the very near future, he would be there to back up Sam while he was helping Mike.

~~Friends will be friends, when you're in need of love they give you care and attention,
Friends will be friends, when you're through with life and all hope is lost,
Hold out your hand cuz right till the end -Friends will be friends.~~