AN: Okay, so I have an extra, extra long chapter here to make up for all the days that I've missed. I truly apologize...but at least it hasn't been a year, yea? Dang, over 4,000 words. Hope you enjoy! It took me a while to get out...I also didn't get a last chance to look over this, so apologies if there are any mistakes. It's too freakin' late, and I am too freakin' tired.

Chapter Five:

"Jordan."

She wakes with a headache, a knot twisting in her stomach painfully. Something is wrong. Something is very, undeniably wrong. Is it Jack? Jenny? Sammy or Izzy? Has something happened to Perry? To DJ? To—

Her eyes snap open and she sits up, shouting, "JD!" Her eyes swivel wildly, and she finds faces swimming in front of her.

"Jordan, calm down," the face with curls of fire says, guiding her back onto something soft, something warm. She doesn't protest. It's been weeks since she's felt anything this nice.

"Jordan," the face says again, "we put you on morphine." She nods and smiles dreamily. She likes morphine. "Can you...remember what happened?"

"Happened?" Jordan repeats tiredly. Now she's too hot. She tries to push the warmth away. Someone holds her hands, her arms.

"Let me go." She panics. "Let me go!"

"Jordan, it's just me," the face soothes. "It's Perry."

"Perry?" she gasps, and she tries to concentrate on his wavering features. She's too tired. And too warm. "Why's it so warm?"

"It's not," Perry assures her. She feels a lock of sweaty hair being brushed away from her face. "You're sick, Jorderoo. You have a fever."

She closes her eyes, shakes her head. "Wh-Where's DJ? Where'd they take him?"

She hears Perry swallow hard and clear his throat. "He..." he hesitates. "He's with the kids, honey. Calm down. He's fine."

"You're lying," she grinds out, gasping as she thrashes. "It's too hot! It's too God-damn hot!" She opens her eyes. The faces swim sadly. "Where's DJ?" She feels wetness glide down her cheeks. "Where is he?"

0 o 0 o 0

Perry and Carla step out from behind the curtain that shields Jordan from the other waiting for their return.

"So?"

Perry glares at Turk. "'So' nothing. She's still sick. She can't tell us anything."

"Per, it's been three days since we found her," Carla points out solemnly. "If we don't get information from her soon..."

"I know," Perry snaps, pacing the floor.

Things are not looking well. Jordan is getting worse, and the symptoms are slowly progressing into something dangerously familiar. Not to mention the fact that Dan slipped away a couple of nights ago after having an argument about rescuing JD now that Jordan is back. He hadn't left a note, but everyone assumes he has gone off on his own one-man rescue mission.

"JD doesn't have a blueberry muffin's chance in Bobbo's grasp if we don't get him out of there soon."

"We should be making plans," Turk says softly, having been the only one to side with Dan the night of his disappearance and—to no one's knowledge—see him off with a "good luck" and a crack about starting his own army of rubber duckies.

"What plans, Gandhi?" Perry growls. "We sure as hell can't get him out of there."

"And we're not leaving him," Turk bites angrily. "We just got him back."

"Don't you think I know that?" the older doctor shouts. "I was there! I saw it happen! He was dead! And I thought...I thought..." Perry swallows, rubbing a hand roughly down his face. "And now he could be dead again, and I can't do this. I won't." Perry storms back towards Jordan's room, but he doesn't go very far before televisions stationed around the large expanse buzz to life, and a very angry-looking man takes the screen.

"Citizens of the remaining America," he begins, and the dozens of people standing around the bunker groan or roll their eyes.

This man is General Francis Leed, the military operative who single-handedly brought down the democracy when he, as Vice President, took over the country after the spreading disease had claimed the President. (Though rumors have been floating since the man's death—the President hadn't shown any symptoms, hadn't let on in the least that he was sick, and many people were under the impression that it had been Leed who had taken care of the leader that had almost completely snuffed out the war. Of course, rumors are just rumors...) The "remaining America" that the general is talking about is the government and anyone who has sided with them. These people—these military initiatives—never address the resistance.

"Today," Leed continues, "we celebrate the end of the resistance."

Silence falls over the crowds watching the small, black-and-white televisions littering the bunker.

0 o 0 o 0

3 Days Earlier

JD is shoved into the small prison barrack, hearing the last of Jordan's protests before the door slams shut with a foreboding clang. He can't help the sharp intake of air, the brief thoughts about what he has ultimately just done, not only to himself but to his family, his friends.

He glances around and winces. The place is filthy. Mold on the walls, a small, blinking lightbulb hanging from the low ceiling, bugs crawling everywhere. If Jordan survives with little less than the plague, it will be a miracle.

Hollock watches him survey the small space. There is barely enough room for the small, rusted toilet that doesn't flush and the mattress that sits so low against the muddy ground that it serves about as much purpose as a rag on solid rock.

"Apologies if it's not up to your normal standards," Hollock mocks without any real vehemence. "But I don't suppose you're used to anything better."

JD doesn't say anything, merely hunkers down on the dirty mattress and releases a sigh of exhaustion as he leans back against the cold, wet wall. This is what he gets for being a savior, a martyr—a hole in the pit of hell with no one to keep him company but the devil's advocate.

"I think you have something to tell me," the general says, leaning against the wall opposite the young man. He obviously has no problem being in this place. Maybe he's spent too much time down here.

"How do I know she's safe?" JD says, closing his eyes and letting himself get lost in the sounds. Water dripping, lightbulb flickering, bugs flying and crawling and gnawing...Okay, maybe that last one is just JD's imagination. But he swears he hears something chewing.

"I gave you my word, Dorian."

"Dorian-Cox."

"You just have to accept it." Hollock crosses his arms. "Now, tell me what you know."

JD's eyes open, and his head lolls in the other man's direction, his dark, dull eyes centered on Hollock as he purses his lips. "Do your superiors know it was your son who started the war?" he asks, his voice wavering as his hands begin to shake.

James Hollock stiffens, his eyes growing wide. "What did you say?" he whispers past dry lips.

0 o 0 o 0

3 Days Later

"Today, we celebrate the end of the resistance."

The camera pans to a young man sitting in a metal chair between two soldiers, a black hood over his head. He doesn't look well. He fights for breath, and his wheezing makes the hood over his head flutter with every fighting breath. The physique is frighteningly familiar, though the hood makes it impossible to tell whether it's...

"No," Perry says with a shake of his head. "That's not him. They're bluffing."

Carla looks to Turk. "Baby?"

Turk's jaw is set rigidly, his head slowly shaking from side to side. "I don't know. It looks...It looks like—"

"It's not," Perry counters.

"Then it's sure one hell of a look-a-like," the surgeon mutters, wincing as the screen roughly jerks back to Leed.

"The end of the war is near," he says. "We have captured the resistance leader, John Dorian."

"Dorian-Cox, mother fucker," Perry mumbles through clenched teeth.

"His execution will be public, so that the people of America—as well as the resistance—will know what fate falls on traitors of the country."

"What country?" Perry scoffs.

"Execution?" Carla gasps quietly, her hand going over to her mouth as the camera pans back to the young man and a soldier holding a gun to the left side of his head.

"General Hollock," Leed says from off-screen.

"Christ," Perry whispers, a look of fear finally taking his face as he steps closer to the television. "They're not going to do it right—"

"You may proceed."

"They wouldn't—" the Irishman starts but is immediately cut off by the gunshot that crackles from the stereo, watching with horror as the young man's head jerks violently to the side, falling limp after a spray of crimson and wet, jiggling chunks.

Carla turns her head into Turk's shoulder as several cries echo throughout the bunker.

"The kids," Turk utters, and Carla and Perry's heads snap to him. "The kids...Where...Did they see..." He says no more, standing stunned as Carla and Perry rush towards the larger part of the underground complex.

"Jack? Jenny?" the doctor calls at the same time that the nurse yells for Isabel and Sam. There is screaming amidst a nearby crowd of crying people, and they both head in that direction.

Perry arrives first, finding a stoic Jack holding a hysteric Sam against his chest. Sam is fighting against the young teen, trying to get away. He's screaming, sobbing, beating against Jack's chest.

"No! No! Let go! Jack, let go! Dad! Daddy! What happened to my dad?"

Perry has him in an instant, scooping him up and cradling him close, whispering in his ear. "Sammy. Shh, it's okay. I gotcha."

Sam wraps his arms around the man's neck, burying his tear-stained face in the crook of Perry's neck. Perry swallows hard, eyeing the surrounding sympathizers with annoyance.

"Jack, get Jenny and meet me in your mother's room."

Jack nods absently, turning and scanning the crowd as Perry marches off towards Jordan's make-shift hospital room.

0 o 0 o 0

3 Days Earlier

"Jeremy," JD states softly, reverently, as if the young boy had been his own son. "Jeremy Gale Hollock."

"Don't," the general chokes, his anger building as he steps away from the wall and towards the young doctor. "Don't you dare say that name again."

"Sweet kid," the younger man sighs, lost in his own thoughts. "Smart. Funny. Like his mom."

JD doesn't anticipate the blow to his face to be so soon, but he does expect it. He barely lets loose a groan, his head jerking violently from the right-hook.

And then Hollock is in his face. "Don't you say one more word, Dorian. Don't you dare."

The young doctor spits a wad of blood onto the mattress, straightening and taking a slow breath. "Dorian-Cox," he corrects quietly. Hollock delivers another blow before standing and leaving the cell.

0 o 0 o 0

3 Days Later

Perry stares desperately at the small group of people that have congregated in Jordan's curtained-off room, namely Carla and Turk, as well as the kids. Sammy still sniffles at his shoulder, but exhaustion is slowly overtaking him, and for that the older man is thankful.

"Alright," he says in a gruff voice, "I know what you just saw is..." He falters. He doesn't want to think about what they just saw. It could have been JD. It wasn't JD, of course...but it looked so much like him...Perry shakes his head of the thoughts, gritting his teeth. "We're going to be okay. JD is fine. We just have to focus on what's happening right now until he gets back."

"Doctor Cox," Turk protests, but Perry shakes his head.

"Not now, Gandhi." He surveys the children, their eyes wet and their small forms shaking. He leans down, Sam still in his arms. "Listen," he says quietly, looking to each of them in turn, "Jordan is sick. And Sammy is very sad right now. Jenny, Izzy, your job is to help Sam, okay?" The girls nod. "And Jacky, your job is to keep an eye on your mother while I work on making her better." Jack nods, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

Perry stands, stepping towards the married couple and gently handing Sam to Turk. "Carla, I need you in the other room."

Carla nods and follows him quietly. When they are out of ear-shot, she says, "It's here again, isn't it?"

Perry sighs, his hands finding the back of his head as he swivels around to face her. "Yea."

The nurse nods. "Okay. Should I get an IV ready?"

Months ago, as the outbreak of the disease was winding down, JD and Perry had found something. They had wondered why only some people seemed to get sick, why so many were dropping like flies while they, the lucky ones, remained unscathed. A blood pathologist from a hospital on the east coast found them, having explored the same concept.

There was a strain, a very small one but one nonetheless, that acted as a vaccine. Anyone who carried it was immune to the sickness that had quickly wiped out millions, and anyone who received a blood transfusion from these people were ultimately cured. Anyone who'd had a blood transfusion within the last decade could also be a carrier, though the strain would not be strong enough to pass on.

To cure this disease, the blood has to be from the source of the strain.

"We can't," Perry says, and at Carla's questioning look, he continues, "Jordan is a carrier. Whatever this is...it's got ahold of our only defense."

0 o 0 o 0

2 Days Earlier

Hollock holds his breath as the line on the other end of the phone he holds close to his ear pulses twice before someone answers.

"Hello?"

He swallows, closing his eyes. "M-Meredith," he stutters, biting the inside of his cheek as the line goes quiet.

"James?" the woman asks softly, coldly.

"I need to ask you something," the general breathes, his words rushed and desperate.

Meredith sighs. "James, I thought I told you not to—"

"It's about Jeremy."

Another silence before she says, "What about Jeremy?"

Hollock takes a deep breath. "Do you remember...in the hospital...What was the name of his doctor?"

"Oh," Meredith says just above a whisper, as if she had been expecting something else. "It was...Dorian." The general stiffens. "John Dorian. Jeremy called him 'JD.'" When Hollock says nothing, she gently calls his name. "James?"

"I'm sorry," he says in a gruff voice, clearing his throat. "For calling, I mean...It's good to hear your voice, Mer."

"James," Meredith sighs, a pained sound. "Please...don't call again."

"I won't," the general promises. "Goodbye." He hangs up before she can respond, sitting in his chair for a long while before there is a knock at the door."

"Enter," he says without thinking, and a broad-shouldered, young soldier opens the door, stepping through and immediately stiffening.

"Sir," he says curtly, "the prisoner has been moved to interrogation three, as you requested."

Hollock nods, a contemplative frown forming on his lips as the soldier does an about-face and leaves. He and Dorian have much to discuss.

0 o 0 o 0

2 Days Later

"It's a different strain of the the virus," the man leaning over a microscope says.

Perry resists the urge to roll his eyes. "No shit."

The man, a blood pathologist named Phil, straightens and gives the other doctor a pointed look. "But it's not that different. We can alter what we have."

Perry nods. "Okay. Get it done."

He leaves before the pathologist can say anything more, weaving his way to Jordan's room. He enters to find Jack sitting diligently by his mother's bed, Sam sitting in one corner and smiling half-heartedly at the board game that Izzy and Jenny are trying to involve him in, and Carla overseeing everything from her perch beside the monitors.

She glances up as Perry enters, giving him a questioning look. Perry sighs and smiles tightly. "She's going to be fine." His voice makes everyone look up. "The doc says he can help her."

0 o 0 o 0

2 Days Earlier

JD does not look well. Aside from the bruises splashed across his left cheekbone, the young doctor also looks a little ruffled. Hollock thinks that he should have the prison guards changed out for...less homophobic soldiers.

"You were my son's doctor," the general says as soon as he takes a seat. He sees no need for cutting corners now. JD takes a moment to focus on the man. If the way his head is bleeding is any indication, Hollock guesses that the young man has a concussion.

As the words settle, JD takes a deep, wheezing breath, wincing before saying, "Yes." His voice is small, airy. Broken ribs.

Damn it, Hollock seethes to himself, seriously considering finding the man a medic.

JD takes another agonizing breath. The general catches sight of dried blood on the doctor's teeth. "I-I'm surprised...I haven't met General Leed yet. Isn't he...jumping at a chance to meet me?"

Hollock winces, both at the statement and the breaths that JD must take to get the statement out. "He's on his way from Washington. You'll meet him soon enough."

He stares long and hard at the young man, trying to recognize him, trying to pull up a single memory of him. He can't. He'd been too focused on his son...But he remembers how happy Jeremy had been despite everything, how well he had coped because "JD" had helped him through it. All of it.

"You were there when Jeremy died." It's meant to be a question, but it comes out more of a fact then anything. Somehow the general knows the answer before JD nods.

"He was a...brave kid," the doctor rasps, his voice full of liquid. Hollock frowns and opens his mouth to question the young man about his condition. Nothing comes out.

JD reads the look, though, and answers the unspoken thought. "Ribs...punctured a lung...Close to collapsing."

Hollock nods, his lips drawing into a grim line. "What do you know about General Leed?" He isn't comfortable with interrogating the young man further, but if he doesn't, someone else will. And that won't end well.

Suddenly, the door bursts open, and Hollock turns to unleash hell on whoever has interrupted, but the growl at the back of his throat is swallowed as General Leed walks into the interrogation room. Hollock stands to attention.

"Sir."

Leed barely offers Hollock a glance before turning to JD and sneering. "Hollock, you're dismissed."

Hollock does not like the look on the other man's face, or the faces of the men standing behind him. "Sir? I was told I would be in charge of—"

"Dismissed!" Leed snarls, glaring at him.

Hollock winces. "Sir, I really think he needs a—"

"Hollock, if I have to repeat myself one more time, I'll make you Dorian's neighbor in the prison barracks," the other man threatens, stepping aside and gesturing towards the door. Hollock offers JD a worried look before nodding and leaving the room. The young doctor doesn't even spare him a last glance.

0 o 0 o 0

2 Days Later

Perry can feel the burn behind his eyes, the tears that have been kept at bay for too long. Jordan is getting better. Sammy is starting to settle into his normal ways again. And after much preaching and arguing, everyone else seems convinced that JD is still alive...But the feeling is still there—that nagging worm of doubt wriggling at the back of his mind.

JD could be dead. That man, the one that had been shot, it could have been JD. Perry keeps replaying the video of the execution in his mind, and each time the man looks more and more like JD. The way he sits with his left leg sticking out just a bit farther than his right, the way his shoulders settle unevenly when he's tense, the way his adam's apple bobs when he swallows too hard or too fast. The video itself had not been all that clear, but in Perry's head, the picture has clarity to perfection.

JD is dead. Perry will never see him again.

He can't stop the tears that spill onto Jordan's sheets as he buries his head by her side, especially when he feels her soft fingers string through his tangled hair.

0 o 0 o 0

1 Day Earlier

The lightbulb in JD's cell is out, and Hollock squints to make out the young man's form, though he hardly has to squint to find him. JD's wheezing is so pronounced that all the older man has to do is follow the noise.

"Dorian?" he asks, leaning down by the mattress and reaching a hand out. He finds JD's shoulder and turns the young doctor onto his back.

JD lets loose a pained sound before taking a shallow, shuddering breath full of liquid. "Dorian...Cox," he whispers.

"Right," Hollock sighs, hunkering down on the mattress beside him. "What happened?"

"Nothing that...didn't happen...in junior high," JD says. He gives a wheezing gurgle that the older man assumes is a laugh, but it ends in coughing and hacking that makes the general cringe.

"You need a doctor," Hollock murmurs, again knowing the answer before it braves its way past JD's lips.

"I am...a doctor." JD shifts on the mattress, gasping with the effort. "General, you don't...have to worry...I didn't tell them...about Jeremy."

Hollock shakes his head, though the gesture is lost to the darkness. "I wasn't worried about that." He swallows hard. "They're going to execute you. Tomorrow." JD is quiet. "It will be on national television, so that everyone will know..."

"What it means...to be part...of the resistance," the young man finishes. "They'll make me...a martyr."

"They'll make you an example," the general corrects. "They'll kill you and then see how long it takes for the resistance to crack without you."

"The resistance...doesn't need me."

"How can you say that?" Hollock demands incredulously. "I've ordered the deaths of...dozens of people who, with their last breath, utter your name. You can't seriously believe you have nothing to do with the war?"

"The resistance...will go on," JD wheezes in no more than a whisper. "They're strong...And Leed is...kidding himself...if he thinks...otherwise." He takes a long, painful breath. "My death will start a new war."

The older man frowns. "You want a another war?" he asks softly.

"Of course not," the doctor spits bitterly, coughing and groaning when the action jostles his ribs, "but it's...inevitable. Fighting...is all that...we're good for...anymore."

Hollock knows this kind of talk. He's spoken it practically his whole life. And until he'd heard about the resistance, about the one known as John Dorian, he'd lived by it—every single word. Faith was not something one could easily afford during a war. When Dorian had been captured, Hollock had hoped to see some of that faith restored, to see what kept the resistance fighting so passionately. And from the very moment that this young, gangly doctor set foot in his interrogation room, he's had his opinion of him.

John Dorian is a disappointment.

"How long have you been like this?" Hollock asks without meaning to. But the question hangs there, begging for elaboration. "How long have you been this person who just doesn't care? Who's willing to give up so that the fighting can continue?" JD doesn't answer, his breathing beginning to get shallower and weaker. "How long has it been since you've been...JD, not John Dorian?"

JD stops breathing, and the general almost panics, but the young man takes a breath. "Too long," he whispers.

"I see," Hollock replies, standing and slowly making his way towards the door. "Well, I certainly hope you can find that young man that helped my son before the end." He knocks, and the door opens. "He's all yours," he says to whoever stands outside.

JD hears boots against hard concrete, and then a soft, familiar voice. "JD?"

0 o 0 o 0

1 Day Later

"Perry?"

The Irishman is shaken awake by an urgent pair of hands. He groggily looks up from his place at Jordan's bedside, finding Carla looking down at him anxiously.

"Wha—"

"Perry, you need to come with me," the nurse says quickly, and the grogginess leaves the man immediately.

"What's going on?" he asks, standing too quickly and feeling a rush of dizziness as he tries to take a step.

Carla steadies him, tugging on his arm and pulling him from the room. "Just...come on."

Perry follows reluctantly, passing concerned and confused faces as the young woman pulls him through the bunker. They finally stop towards the entrance, a group of people crowded around it. Carla weaves her way between people, Perry in tow, and he sees over the many heads blocking their way what their destination is.

"Barbie?" he asks as soon as they've broken through the crowd, and Elliot turns towards him.

"Doctor Cox!" she screeches, rushing forward and taking his hands in hers. He grunts in half-hearted amusement. She still calls him Doctor Cox. If she'd just grow some courage, he'd let her call him "Perry." She's smiling, wide and...fearful.

"What are you doing here?" Perry asks curiously. She and others are supposed to be on the other side of the country, helping where JD can't...will never be able to.

The realization hurts, and the older doctor almost doesn't have the strength to keep more tears at bay. But Barbie's face warps into something that might be determination...with a hint of constipation.

"Doctor Cox, we have someone you might like to see."

AN: Wow! It's actually almost over! I think...If all goes according to plan, there shouldn't be more than one or two more chapters...and if things don't go according to plan...Well, we'll just have to see. Thanks to everyone who's been reviewing! I hope this didn't disappoint! Next chapter up as soon as I can get things together.

Later, Gators! Catch you all in the next chapter!