Jason watched the shadows creep across the wall as the last rays of the dying sun faded from the sky, only to be replaced by darkness so intense that he couldn't see the apartment across the street. He sighed in discontentment and fidgeted with the safety lock on the gun. He felt his finger push it to the off position as his hand mechanically raised it to his temple once more.

This was it, no turning back. What was it that all those cartoon characters always said when they were at the end of their ropes and staring the reaper in the eye? Goodbye cruel world…Jason scoffed, if only they knew what it really felt like to be in that position, there was nothing remotely humorous or cute about it.

However, over the past few hours he had come to find that camping out on death's doorstep wasn't nearly as bad as he had initially thought. After all, it was something that he had been doing for years. As a ranger he had constantly avoided deaths cold embrace, sometimes on a day to day basis as he battled countless monsters and flunkies that his enemies threw at him. But even then, when the possibility of death was so close, he hadn't given it much thought. Of course he had been worried about his team, any good leader would, but the possibility of death seemed a remote one at best, something that happened to someone else. But looking back over the years at all the close calls he and his team had he realized something very important that he had missed before. He was more familiar with the Grim Reaper than he cared to be, after all, they had been doing this little dance for years. Now it was finally time to stop fighting the inevitable and welcome the cold embrace that came with the liberating release of life; it was time to dance his last dance with the Reaper.

He could almost feel cold fingers closing around his throat as the crushing darkness waited to reached out and embrace him in a blanket of painless sleep. He closed his eyes and tried to steady his badly shaking hand as he mustered his last ounce of courage to pull the trigger. Almost of its own accord he felt his finger tightening around the sliver of metal that would end all of his pain with one bullet's lethal kiss, but even then a glimmer of doubt remained at the back of his rational mind, screaming for him to stop…

"Jason?" A soft voice from the doorway reached his ears and turned his blood to ice.

He quickly recovered form his initial shock of being discovered and lowered the gun as the owner of the voice reached of the light switch. Blinding white light flooded the room and brought painful tears to his eyes.

"Jason, are you ok," asked Kat softly.

He nodded, hoping that she would go away and leave him in peace. There was no need that she should be present to witness what he was about to do. "I'm fine," he responded, perhaps more coldly than he had intended, and he mentally kicked himself for the way his voice shook.

Kat must have noticed his apprehension because she stepped farther into the room. "Are you sure?"

"Yes," he said quickly as he felt her walking closer. "Please, just leave me alone."

For a moment she stopped dead in her tracks, taken aback by the anger in his voice. But once she realized that the anger wasn't necessarily directed at her alarms started to go off in her head. She cleared the distance between her and the wheelchair bound Jason in a matter of seconds.

"Oh my God, Jason." Her voice came out as a tiny, frightened, whisper and her hands flew to her mouth in a gesture of disbelief when she spotted the gun lying on his lap. Tears sprung to her eyes and her voice cracked.

"No," she said, "no, no, no, no."

Jason refused to look at her, choosing instead to stare blankly out the window into the darkness. "Just go away."

Kat shook her head wildly, her blond hair flying around her face and mingling with the flying tears. "Jason, what are you doing? This is wrong!"

"You have no idea," said Jason, "I can't live like this. I can't take a shower without help, I can't get dressed without help, I can't…hell, I can't do anything without help!" He felt his anger bubbling to the surface, threatening to explode at any given moment.

"There's another way! Jason, this is not you! Please, just give me the gun and we'll find another way."

Jason snapped. He wrenched his gaze from the window and focused all of his rage on her. "There is NO other way," he yelled. "Why can't you see that? I can't live this way. I just can't! I can't live my life in a wheelchair! But I don't expect you, or anyone else to understand. My life is not worth living anymore! I don't want your pity or your sympathy, I want your absence! So just go the hell away and leave me in peace!"

He dropped his head in shame as his anger fizzled out; ashamed for yelling at Kat and ashamed because he felt warm tears sliding over his own cheeks.

Kat crouched down beside him and gently placed one hand on his knee. "Jason…"

He shook his head as the tears flowed freely and he finally admitted what he had been trying to deny for so long. "I don't want to die…and I can't do this on my own." That was the one thing that bothered him the most, being forced to rely on someone else to help him do the simple things that he could no longer do.

Kat placed her other hand on his shoulder, "you don't have to be alone," she said quietly, "You have me." Then as an after thought she added, "And Tommy and Kim."

Jason slowly nodded, his gaze returning to the window as a few bright stars began to break through the darkness to shed pristine light on the sleeping city below. He closed his eyes and wiped at his face with the sleeve of his shirt as Kat's warm hand slipped into his and squeezed it encouragingly.

"You're never alone Jason," she said as she picked up the gun and moved it out of his reach. "You have me. I'll always be here for you. We'll get through this. Together."

He squeezed her hand in returned and forced himself to meet her affectionate gaze. "How?"

See that pretty little button? Click it and leave a review, please. :)