So, I have to admit, I've been a little disappointed with how little the writers have given Ressler to do the past two weeks. After getting us SUCH a good start with him, with them humanizing him and seeing that beautiful grin and sense of humour (and that awesome second episode (tampon anyone?!) suddenly we were back to him standing in the war room looking at monitors or flashing his badge importantly as he interviewed people. And then when Samar and Liz were the ones rushing to the airport to apprehend the suspect, I about screamed at the TV – "give me Ressler and Liz at the airport together!" But that scream would have paled in comparison to the one that came when I realized we weren't going to get a scene with Ressler going to check on an infected Liz when she was behind the glass door! I SOO wanted to see that! So when the writers didn't give us that, I decided to rectify that situation!

The corridor leading to Gate C-17 at Dulles was deserted as Ressler walked briskly down it. Airports were supposed to be busy. Pushing and shoving past people to get to the gate that was always at the furthest point from where you happened to be now. So this really didn't feel right, walking past Gate after Gate with no one around. At the far end of the hallway men in yellow bio suits were gathered and he made a bee line for them. He approached the Gate now, not entirely sure where Liz and Samar were. Aram had said Gate C-17, but didn't elaborate. As Ressler approached, he noted the handful of FBI agents standing by the window. What he noticed first was that the CDC types were dressed head to toe in yellow plastic and all he could see were their masked faces, basically. The poor ole' Feds were dressed in… well, FBI jackets.

Seems a little…unsafe…

After spending three hours with Aram tracking down the other flights and getting them grounded or turned back, they had finally got done with the FFA. Aram had then left the war room to see Cooper, after a couple of secret phone calls in corners muttering something about power grids. But at that point, Ressler really wasn't listening. He needed to get out of the war room. Checking his right pocket out of sheer habit, making sure his ...little friends... were there he'd grabbed his keys and headed to the surface. He knew where he was heading.

Because by then the only thing he needed to track down was… Liz.

Getting to Dulles hadn't been easy. With the quarantine in place, he'd had to show his badge at every street corner. He was almost turned back numerous times. At one point he'd about had a stand up fist fight with one 'weekend warrior' National Guardsman type, but he'd persevered until he finally pulled up outside the airport. And now he was almost at Gate C-17, and there…

There she is...

He hadn't been sure what to expect. She'd been infected with the plague and his mind was running rampant. Would she be delirious...? Or unconscious? Or all sweaty and babbling... Or would she be covered with something… really infectious looking all over her.

So when he saw Liz and Samar huddled together at the door looking...normal... he was both surprised and relieved.

He'd expected them to be quiet and pensive. So he was rather taken aback when he saw them…laughing.

Okay...

He flashed his badge yet again to the yellow plastic guy who had turned to ward him off, then dropped down to a crouch and tapped on the glass. Liz looked up at the sound, and on seeing him smiled in surprise, wondering how on earth he had got there.

"Ressler? How? How did you get in…?" she asked him. From behind her, Samar leaned forward a little, looking up at him.

He couldn't hear her very well through the glass. And he didn't want to shout out their conversation for the world – well, the few Feds and plastic CDC guys to hear. Opening his coat he showed her his phone and she reached for hers too. Feeling like some bizarre prison visitor on the other side of the glass with a corrupt underworld criminal, he sat down on the floor, leaned on the glass to face her and pressed her speed dial number.

She smiled, answered, and now he heard her voice clearly. "How did you get in?" she asked.

"Drove here. Only had to flash my badge 847 times. It was a piece of cake really." He smiled at her.

She chuckled at that. "But you shouldn't have come…it's not safe here." She told herself that, but really, she didn't mean that. She was very surprised... very glad… to see him here.

His smile left his face as he looked at her now. "Are you all right…? I mean really, are you feeling okay Liz…?" he asked her, speaking quietly into his phone, searching her eyes for the truth.

He saw the momentary flash of fear before she hid it. "Yeah, actually I am. Samar isn't doing too good though, as she has a gunshot wound."

Ressler settled more comfortably on the floor, and looked beyond Liz again to where Samar was sitting in the corner. "She got shot…?" I 'only' thought she was infected with a deadly disease.

Liz looked at him and bit her bottom lip. "Our suspect fired at her a split second before I took him out... if I'd been a second faster..." He saw her look over at the body in the room, then back at Samar. She leaned into Samar then, hugging the woman and reassuring her.

Curious. Four hours ago he'd watched Samar storm off from Liz after a mini catfight in the war room, and he'd been ready to go give her a piece of his own mind. Now they're gal pals, apparently.

Women. I'll never understand them.

He nodded. "Well, I'm sure everything happened very fast." Hell, she's infected with the plague, what good will beating herself up about firing a split second too late do at this point?

She looked back at him, speaking into her phone to him again as she turned a little more to face him. "Any progress on the other planes?"

He knew what she was doing. If she focused on work, she wouldn't have to think about herself dying of the plague in some airport lounge.

"Yeah, got 'em all back before they reached their target cities." He told her, thinking of the endless phone calls that had taken. He had the FFA on speed dial now - and was practically on first name terms with all their employees. "It took a while, but Aram and I got there." He said tiredly, leaning on the glass.

And then I hightailed it out of there before Cooper could bench me again.

He stopped, looking at her. If there had been no pane of glass between them, they'd have literally been about sitting in each other's laps – sitting on the floor on each side of the door, facing each other. Funny how …safe… a barrier a pane of glass could be. Leaning on the glass, looking inside at the room it hit him that he'd told Cooper they had no cure. But now...that seemed so much more real. So much more...

He looked into her eyes and held them. "Liz…" he started, but she interrupted.

"I know. Don't say it. We'll get out of this, okay?" She met his eyes, leaning against the glass and he nodded before briefly looking away at the yellow CDC guys.

How? There is no cure. But he wasn't going to argue with a …dying woman.

He changed the subject, somewhat. "How's Samar doing there?" he asked, not really being able to see where she'd been shot or how bad it was.

Liz turned and hugged the woman again before turning back to Ressler.

She just hugged her again… Seriously…Women…

"I have the wound packed with my coat and the bleeding is somewhat under control for now. She got hit in her left side…" she told him, looking back at him. Her hands were bloody, he noticed now.

"Are you okay?" she surprised him when she asked him, looking at him with concern from the other side of the glass. From mere inches away, really.

She's the one in the room infected with the plague, and she's asking me if I'm okay?

He looked down, then back up at her. "Yeah…I'm fine. Been a long day. But yeah, I'm fine." Worried …about you… but I'm fine Liz…

"Because you don't look fine Ress…" she said softly, holding the phone closer as she met his eyes.

"Just tired Liz. You know, it's not that easy being stuck back at the war room with Cooper and Aram all day while you two are out having fun in the field." Getting infected and injured…and maybe dying in front of me… He smiled, trying to make light of it. He had tried very, very hard this afternoon, after hearing that she'd been infected. To anyone else, it might have even looked like he hadn't even been concerned.

But Liz saw through that. Of course she did.

He changed tack again. "What were you laughing about right before I got here?"

She looked at him a second, and then grinned as she turned to Samar. "Oh, you don't want to know that."

He got it. "Aaahh, girl crap." He smiled, and again wondered how the hell Liz and Samar had suddenly become besties in such a short time.

I guess dying together will do that… And that sobered him up. He looked at his watch. If they didn't have a cure in 5 hours... I'll be looking for a new partner.

She saw the look in his eyes, and knew what he'd been thinking when he looked at his watch. She couldn't let him dwell there.

"Nipple guards." She smiled.

He blushed. "Um…?" He raised his eyebrows at that.

She cracked up when she saw the expression on his face. It struck her again how boyish and charming blushing made him seem, the rare times she'd seen it. And in that moment she wanted the pane of glass gone and wanted to… well, she wanted the pane of glass gone.

"It would be lost in translation, but yeah, that's what we were laughing about." She smiled.

She looked up at him leaning beside her, then placed her hand on the window, palm facing him.

He looked at her hand. "Are we going to do that whole Mr Spock and Captain Kirk thing?" he suddenly smiled, taken by the likeness to 'that' famous death scene in the Star Trek movies.

His smile left his face as he said it though and he met her eyes beyond her hand. In the movie they'd been saying goodbye when they did that. He wasn't going to say goodbye to Liz. Not like this.

She dropped her hand now, laying it back at her side. "No, not today." She felt it too.

She looked back at Samar then and checked her pulse. The woman was losing blood and needed to be out of here. They both needed to be out of here, but she wasn't sure how or if that was going to happen. She looked back at her partner, seeing him leaning on the glass thoughtfully.

"I'm sorry..." she said, and his eyes lifted up to hers. "I came in here deliberately to help Samar. I chose to come in here and I got infected. I'm not sorry I helped her. But I'm sorry if that's...going to be the last thing I ever do for another person..."

He understood. "I know." he smiled. "I'd have done the same thing." And maybe me being here will be the last thing I ever do for you Liz...

"Of course you would... my Boy Scout." and she smiled then, tracing her finger on the glass near his hand that was resting on his knee. He looked down then, and blinked back sudden tears. He didn't want her to see that. She's the one dying here...

From beyond her, he heard a phone ringing as Liz turned toward the sound. It was Samar's phone and she answered it breathlessly.

After a brief conversation, she hung up and looked at them both. "That was Aram. Said he's been trying to call each of you but couldn't get through". He thought there may be something wrong with your phones." She smiled at them knowingly, watching them both as they looked sheepishly at each other, still holding their phones up to their ears.

"Anyway, Reddington has obtained the cure after finding it at the compound, and vials of it are now arriving at the hospital." She leaned back on the wall and closed her eyes at that news, catching her breath. Liz laid her hand on her in reassurance.

It took a second for that to sink in to Ressler's brain. She'd said it so casually.

Reddington had found the cure.

Reddington did? Well of course he did.

Liz turned back to him and smiled tiredly. "So I guess this won't be the last thing I do for another." And Ressler nodded, dropped his gaze and smiled thankfully at that.

"So what does that mean for us getting out of here?" Liz started to ask, but then saw the answer herself. The plastics (as Ressler was now referring to them) were approaching the glass, full of intent, their yellow containment suits crackling.

"Sir, I'm going to need you to step back. We have authorization to enter the room and evac the patients to the hospital. And you can't be here." He noticed the other FBI agents were already well on their way down the corridor, out of the way.

Ressler looked at Liz as she smiled at him and spoke into her phone. "We'll be okay. How about you head back before Cooper misses you?"

He hesitated. He didn't want to leave her right now, yet he had no protective clothing on. He nodded, knowing he had to leave. But before he did, he gave her his half smile, then placed his palm on the glass in front of her. She met his eyes and smiled and placed her smaller hand on his, the only thing between them, a quarter inch sheet of glass.

"I'll see you on the other side, Ress." She smiled.

"Live long and prosper." He deadpanned into his phone, and she cracked up up at that, making Samar wonder what the joke was.

He held his hand there a moment longer as he smiled at her, watching her laugh. They didn't need to say anything else and both hung up their phones, letting them slide back in their pockets.

He got up off the floor and stood looking down at the two of them, then moved aside as the plastics made ready to break the seal on the door.

"Sir, if you will head down with the agents toward the far end of the corridor, we will see to the ladies and get them to the hospital. We'll take good care of them." Ressler thought he sounded like a storm trooper, talking through his mouthpiece on his suit.

God, it's been a long day. I'm losing it.

He smiled at Liz again, looked at the plastic, then left and walked down the hallway. As he was walking down the hallway alone, his phone rang and fishing it out of his pocket he saw that it was Liz.

He answered the call without saying a word, and all she said was "Thank you. It meant a lot." And she hung up.

He smiled. He hadn't needed to reply.

"Be safe Liz…" he said softly to himself, exiting the corridor now as behind him, the plastics broke the seal on the door.