Thanks as always to my betas, HarmonyLover and chai4anne.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Sir, please try to help me understand what happened," Will said tiredly to the Vice President. He was sitting in an overstuffed chair in Russell's suite. The campaign was getting ready to check out of the hotel and head to the next event. Will was exhausted; he hadn't slept at all the previous night. Nothing made sense. Donna had been arrested, for reasons he still didn't understand. As soon as Donna had been escorted away, Russell had announced that he was going to bed and ordered Will not to discuss the incident with anyone. Mindful of those instructions, Will had turned off his phone overnight, and by morning he'd had a slew of voicemails from virtually every news network, as well as from Josh and Leo. He'd passed on Josh's message to the VP; Josh was right; the best thing politically for the Vice President to do was to drop the charges. Will was sure it was the best thing morally, too. Whatever had happened, he was certain Donna didn't deserve to have her life ruined over this incident.

The incident with Donna wasn't the only thing that had kept Will awake; the unfolding drama of the missing airplane had also made sleep impossible. The initial celebratory reports that the plane had been found and all of the passengers were alive had soon been tempered when the reporters had learned that two passengers were missing. Josh and the congressman had gone out in search of help hours ago, and no one had seen or heard from them since; clearly, they'd never made it to the road they'd been heading for. Will had sat in front of the television, watching footage of searchers combing the woods with a knot in his stomach until it was finally reported that Josh and Matt had been found, injured but alive.

"Donna Moss is a nutcase, that's what happened. Great hiring job there, Bailey," Russell answered Will's question sharply.

"She's not a…nutcase. She has no reputation for erratic behavior," Will stammered, defending Donna, and himself.

"Well, she's never had a job like this before, has she? She was, what, a receptionist or something before you hired her?"

"A senior assistant in the West Wing."

"Whatever. She answered phones for a living. A far cry from doing work like this. Obviously the stress was too much for her."

"It wasn't the stress of the job, sir. Josh Lyman was in that plane crash. She was worried about him."

"They were friends at the White House?"

Will stared at him in astonishment. The Vice President really was oblivious to the people around him, at least people whom he didn't view as being in a position to benefit him. Apparently an assistant in the West Wing didn't merit so much as a blip on his radar. "She was his assistant for seven years! They were…" Will wondered how much about their relationship he should reveal. "Yeah. They were close."

"Oh." The Vice President looked only slightly chastened. "Well, I sympathize, of course, but it still doesn't excuse her egregiously unprofessional behavior. I can't have people on my staff who don't have control over their emotions."

"Sir-"

"If she was so upset, why didn't she take a break from the campaign trail?"

"I tried to get her to, sir."

"And the whole thing's a bit of a conflict of interest, don't you think? Someone on our staff being all cozy with our opponent's campaign manager?"

"Santos wasn't even running when I hired Donna. And anyway-"

"Well, the second he announced his campaign, I should have been made aware of the situation."

"The situation-" Will stared at the Vice President, perplexed. "Sir, due respect, but we're talking about Matt Santos here. Since when do you consider him a threat?"

"I don't."

"You do." The realization dawned on Will. "That's why you had me dig up dirt on him and leak the Mayflower quote. It wasn't because you thought the Santos campaign might siphon off a few of our votes. That doesn't even make sense. He'd be more likely to split Hoynes's vote than ours; he represents another option for people wanting to vote for someone other than the default front-runner. The Santos campaign probably actually helps us. Unless…all those comments about what a joke his campaign is…were crap, weren't they? You're actually worried that Santos could win."

"I don't know." Russell's jaw twitched. "I worked with him in the House. He's charismatic, I can tell you that. And he's smart, and people underestimate him at their peril. And with Josh Lyman running his campaign…let's just say I wanted to nip this thing in the bud."

"And that's why you were so upset about the news coverage of the plane crash."

"Damn right it was! It's exactly what he needed to catapult him into a serious contender for the nomination. God, did you see the media fawning over him at his press conference this morning? It was disgusting."

"Right." Will closed his eyes momentarily. "But I still don't understand what happened with Donna."

"She went crazy. She saw that whackjob who sabotaged the plane on CNN, and I guess he was one of the fringe candidates she'd gone to meet with yesterday morning…"

"Oh my God." Will felt his heart drop. He couldn't believe he hadn't put it together until now. Burton's name had sounded familiar to him, but somehow he hadn't made the connection. He'd been distracted by the situation with Donna, and then consumed by the news about the airplane, and he just hadn't given much thought to the man who'd confessed to sabotaging it.

Russell continued. "She was convinced he'd sabotaged the plane because she'd visited him, and when I wouldn't share in that particular delusion of hers, she lost it and started screaming at me."

"God, poor Donna. I should never have…" Will's voice trailed off, his face stricken.

"Poor Donna? Whose side are you on, anyway?"

"Sir, maybe you could have tried to be a little more sensitive with her."

"I'm the Vice President. I'm not going to be constantly watching my tongue to avoid hurting the feelings of oversensitive campaign staffers. I have more important things worry about. Anyone who doesn't like working for me, there's the door." He gestured toward the door of the hotel suite.

Will closed his eyes. "So then what happened?"

"She shoved me into a table."

"She told the Secret Service agent at the scene that you grabbed her arm and she was pushing you away." The agent had been pretty tight-lipped when Will had started peppering him with questions, but he'd ended up giving him at least that much information.

"I didn't…I may have touched her arm. For heaven's sake, I didn't 'grab' it."

The admission hit Will like a punch in the gut. "You lied to the Secret Service. You said she pushed you, unprovoked."

"Oh please. Look, I'm not going to get dragged into a whole thing in the media about whether I touched her arm, or grabbed it, or tried to tear it from her torso, or whatever she's going to be claiming by the time this thing is over. She pushed me; that's what matters. I'm the Vice President of the United States, and she pushed me into a table. You don't get to do that."

"It's a federal offense to make false statements to the Secret Service."

"It's her word against mine. Who are people going to believe?"

"I don't know, but if the Republican Congress chooses to believe her, you could be impeached. Or forced to resign. Two Vice Presidents leaving office in disgrace in less than four years. Forget your campaign; do you have any idea what that would do to the Democratic Party? Or to President Bartlet's legacy?" Do you even care? Will found himself wondering. Actually, no. He didn't wonder.

Bob Russell stared daggers at him. "President Bartlet's legacy is not my concern, nor is it yours. You work for me."

"Not anymore I don't."

"Excuse me?"

"I quit."

Russell sighed. "Come on, Will, I didn't mean it that way. Of course I care about the President. I just meant…"

"I know exactly what you meant." His voice rose as he stared at his boss – his former boss. Any illusions he'd had about the Vice President were suddenly stripped away. The man was someone who was capable of not feeling the slightest twinge of remorse that his campaign had messed with the head of a lunatic hours before he'd tried to kill six people. He was a man who'd lied without a second thought to protect himself, even if it meant sending someone like Donna to jail.

He should have listened to his intuition, Will realized. He'd felt uncomfortable from the start about taking the job with the Vice President. The very manner in which Russell had approached him about the position should have been a clue that something was wrong. What did it say about Russell's character that one of his first actions as Vice President had been to poach from the staff of the man who'd elevated him into that position? But Will had allowed himself to be flattered by the praise Russell had heaped on him, and the possibility of having a top position – maybe even chief of staff – in the next administration had been undeniably seductive. He'd still been feeling dizzy and disoriented from his recent promotion into Sam Seaborn's old job, and he'd convinced himself that this was just how things were done, that they were all on the same team and it didn't matter whether he reported to the Vice President or the President (or rather, to a guy who reported to a guy who reported to the President), that Toby was just being his usual grumpy, inflexible self when he'd lectured Will about the move. President Bartlet wouldn't have chosen Russell if he weren't worthy, Will had figured, deliberately ignoring the less-than-ideal circumstances under which the choice had been made.

When Russell had admitted what he and his wife had done to Ellie Bartlet, Will had begun to get a picture of the real Bob Russell. But by then it had seemed too late to do anything about it. He'd made his choice, and he'd stood by it, trying not to think too hard about what kind of man he was really working for.

Will continued speaking, his voice shaking. "It was a mistake for me to ever take this job. I should have corrected that mistake a long time ago, but I'm correcting it now. You're not fit to be Vice President, and you're certainly not fit to be President. I can no longer in good conscience try to get you into that office. Sir."

Russell clenched and unclenched his jaw, his arms folded tightly. "You're finished in this town, Bailey. I'll see to that."

"Whatever." Will began to walk toward the door, but then turned around. "Tell the prosecutor to drop the charges against Donna, Mr. Vice President. It's in your own best interest and you know it." He then continued out the door, not looking back.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"You're insane, you know that?" Matt Santos blurted out as soon as Josh and Donna walked into his hotel suite. Leo stood a few feet away from the congressman.

"I think that's probably been public knowledge for quite a few years."

"I'm not kidding, Josh! Those doctors didn't spend eight years in medical school for nothing. What the hell were you thinking?"

"Wait," Donna interjected, glancing from Josh to the congressman. "What are you talking about?"

"He left the hospital against medical advice."

Donna's heart skipped a beat. "What?"

"Thanks for ratting me out," Josh muttered to Matt.

"Josh!" Donna practically shrieked.

"It's fine, Donna. It's nothing to worry about."

"Why on Earth would you do something like that?"

"I had to. I couldn't-" his voice broke off, as if he was mentally editing what he'd been about to say. "You know, lying around in a hospital bed has never been my strong suit. I'm a man of action."

"Because of me?" Donna stared at him as the realization dawned. "You left the hospital to go see me in jail? That was it, wasn't it?"

"Something…like that." He looked at the ground.

"Oh, Josh…" she felt her eyes misting over once again. She was torn between being deeply moved by the gesture, and terrified for him. "You have to go back to the hospital. Now."

"Donna-"

"You could still have something wrong with you. Your heart – they wanted to keep monitoring your heart, didn't they? Is that why they hadn't released you?"

"You know doctors. They just want to cover their asses against malpractice suits."

"Yes, by keeping you alive! I'm taking you back to the hospital right now." She grabbed his arm and nudged him toward the door.

"I'm fine, Donna. I'll make a doctor's appointment for tomorrow just to be sure."

"Josh, what if-"

"I kind of have a lot of work to do. I still have a campaign to run here, in case everyone's forgotten."

"Your work can wait."

"Donna…"

"You listen to me, Joshua Lyman, as someone who thought you were dead a few hours ago, if you think I'm going to let you take crazy chances with your health for no good reason other than your own stubborn pride…" her voice started quavering.

His face softened. "Okay."

"Okay? You'll go?"

"Yeah."

"Good." She let out a breath. "And if you ever pull a stunt like that again…"

"Just don't get yourself arrested next time I'm in the hospital, and we should be fine."

"Shut up."

Matt interrupted their conversation, turning to Donna. "So you must be…"

"I'm sorry." Josh realized he'd forgotten to make introductions. "Congressman, this is Donna Moss."

"The crazy person arrested for pushing the Vice President," she clarified with a grimace.

"Russell had it coming," Josh interjected.

"I don't have any trouble believing that," Matt responded. He shook Donna's hand. "I'm Matt Santos."

"Good to meet you." She paused. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Thanks."

"The congressman was great on TV, by the way," Leo told Josh.

"I didn't exactly have a chance to catch it, but that's what I've heard. Sorry for taking off on you like that, congressman. I just had to…" his voice broke off, and he turned to look at Donna. Their eyes met, and for a second they both forgot there was anyone else in the room.

"Yeah. Leo explained it." There was a note of amusement in Matt's voice.

"How's Ronna doing?" Josh asked.

"Better. They're hoping she might be able to go home by the end of the week."

"Thank God," Josh sighed.

"And the lady's right, Josh," Matt added with a glance at Donna. "Go get yourself checked out. I don't want to see you back in this hotel until you've had a clean bill of health."

"I'll second that," Leo added.

"Every one of you is my mother," Josh grumbled.

"You want me to call her? I bet she'd tell you the same thing," Leo told him pointedly.

"Yeah, yeah, you don't have to threaten me. I'm going," Josh muttered. Donna put a hand on his arm, and they headed together toward the door.