Saul wakes up the next morning curled alongside Jesse. After dinner, Saul helped Jesse into bed and poured him a capful of Nyquil to get the kid to sleep. He stayed awake for a bit after Jesse finally succumbed to slumber, waiting for the nightmares to resurface. But Jesse slept soundly, perhaps too exhausted to dream. For the best, Saul thinks, because he's gonna need to be running on all cylinders today.

Jesse is still asleep, breathing calm and hot against Saul's skin; Saul doesn't want to stir and ruin this quiet little moment where everything is perfect and impermeable. Jesse's tucked against the line of Saul's body, arms looped around him and his face burrowed in the space between Saul's chin and chest. Saul has one arm latched around Jesse's waist to keep him close, as if someone might come and tear him away.

No one's ever loved anyone like Saul loves Jesse Pinkman. He feels it in his bones, knows deep in his soul that this is where he belongs. To lose Jesse now... Saul can't even think about it.

Jesse's hand slides across Saul's back, and he tips his head a bit. Saul presses his mouth to the fuzz of Jesse's hair. "Morning, Pretty Boy." Jesse just holds him tighter, his hands squeezing into fists over Saul's skin as he burrows nearer. "You sleep okay?"

Jesse murmurs something that sounds like a yes.

"You look better," Saul says, trying to be uplifting. "Got more color."

He can feel the heat of Jesse's breath at his throat. Jesse's eyes are closed.

"You want a couple more hours?"

"I wanna be with you," Jesse mumbles, his voice cracked with sleep.

Saul holds him closer and trails kisses over the bristly line of his jaw. He tugs the neck of Jesse's t-shirt down a bit so he can kiss his freckled shoulder. All the tension in Jesse's body melts away under Saul's affection.

"We should just—we should just do it, y'know?" Jesse says. "Go somewhere else. Start over."

"Not 'til we know what they want from us."

Jesse gazes at him with wounded, pleading eyes. "They're cops, Saul. They're not just gonna let this go." He buries his face in Saul's chest again and hugs him close.

"Jesse, listen to me. As long as I'm around, nothing bad is gonna happen to you, alright? You gotta trust me."

"It's everyone else I don't trust."

Hard to argue with that. But Saul thinks it won't be easy for Buck and Billy Ray to switch gears and see them as criminals. You share your life with somebody long enough and they become a part of you. Even in the face of irrefutable evidence, the mind plays tricks, tries to convince itself there's something else at play. When you care about someone, logic goes out the window completely.

Neither of them say anything for a while. They spend the better part of an hour just holding each other and sharing soft, tender touches. Saul doesn't know what's going to happen to them next, but right now he just needs the peace of being here with Jesse.

They're in the kitchen finishing up breakfast when the knock sounds on the front door. Jesse freezes in his chair, his skin impossibly pale. Even now, even when fear's got his heart in a vise grip, Saul can't help but notice how goddamn blue Jesse's eyes are.

Saul rises from his seat and moves for the door. He checks the peephole. Buck and Billy Ray stand on the other side, hands shoved into pockets like they're totally casual. Saul can't see any handcuffs or guns or even a warrant. There's no police cruiser in the driveway or parked on the street. This might not be official police business. The trump card here is they don't know Saul and Jesse are onto them. Best to keep it that way.

Saul opens the door and forces up a pleasant smile. "Well, good morning! What's the occasion?"

"No occasion," Buck says, returning the pleasantry. "Just figured we'd stop by for a little chat between friends." Jesse swallows thickly and pushes away from the table, busying himself with the dishes in the sink. "Nothin' wrong with that, is there?"

"'Course not. Chat away." Saul heads into the kitchen toward Jesse, because if they pick up on the way Jesse's hands are shaking... He comes up behind Jesse and lays his hands over Jesse's own. Jesse startles at the touch, and Saul nibbles at his earlobe. Then he whispers, his mouth at Jesse's ear, "They don't have a warrant. There's no cuffs, no police cruiser. I don't think they're here to arrest you. Maybe they do just wanna talk."

Jesse's chest shudders as his lungs try to take in air. He reaches for a knife in the sink, fingers grasping around the handle, but Saul stops him with a gentle hand.

Another kiss. "I promised you, remember? Trust me, Jesse." Saul hopes this display might make Buck and Billy Ray's suspicion waver; how could they tear apart two people so in love who want nothing more than to spend their lives together?

Buck clears his throat. "Teacher and student, huh? What a match. You teach science, Saul? Naw, it was somethin' else. History, wasn't it? I only ask 'cause I was curious where Aaron picked up all that science shit he spouted off to Duane."

Jesse goes still. Saul really hopes Jesse doesn't have a panic attack here, because there's no way they're talking their way out of that.

"He was a pretty good student all around," Saul says.

"That so?" Buck asks. Billy Ray looks uncomfortable. "How come you ain't in college, Aaron? You're a smart kid. Could'a got in someplace for sure."

Jesse feigns casual, shrugging his shoulders. He risks a quick glance at the two men. "Just 'cause I was good in school didn't mean I liked it." He forces out a chuckle.

"And you," Buck says, focusing on Saul now. "Goin' from a teacher to a paralegal. How's that happen?"

Saul gives a nervous laugh. "You do somethin' long enough and you get tired of it. C'mon, fellas, people change jobs all the time."

"Y'all got any beer?" Billy Ray asks, perhaps trying to lighten the mood. "I'm parched."

But Buck ignores him, asks Jesse, "Aaron, where'd you say you got those scars again?"

Saul slips into lawyer mode, stepping between them and Jesse to use himself as a barrier. "Alright, guys, I gotta say, this is starting to sound like a full-fledged, suspectlike interrogation."

Buck's eyes go comically wide, like he's appalled by the accusation. "What? Naw, we're just havin' a friendly chat."

"Awful specific questions for a friendly chat. In fact, I might categorize all this as, uh, unwarranted persecution."

"You got a real guilty conscience then."

Jesse gulps.

Saul narrows his eyes. "You guys got a thing for him? I mean, I can't really blame you—look at the kid—but as you can see, he's not interested."

"Nah, we don't want nothin' to do with Aaron—or is it Jesse?"

Jesse's heart stops in his chest as the world shrinks around him.

"We know everything you did, Jesse, 'cause you told us. That little tape you made with Schrader? Well, we believe ya, unless you're a total sociopath. You seemed real convincing."

"I don't know what you're talkin' about," Jesse says, but his voice quakes like a fault line.

Buck spreads his hands. "Alright, you can play it that way. But I wonder what might happen if somebody matched your prints on file with the Omaha PD to the prints of one Jesse Pinkman from Albuquerque, New Mexico." Buck moves closer, and Jesse backs away. "You know what else those prints'll match? A couple sets of fingerprints from a compound down in Albuquerque. Cops found a big ol' meth lab there. They also found one Walter White a.k.a. Heisenberg. You remember him, don't ya? The Bonnie to your Clyde?"

The name sends a shiver down Jesse's spine. He whimpers and scrubs a hand over his face. His lungs spasm, gasping for air in frantic breaths as his body goes jittery. Saul rushes to his side and scoops him up in his arms, lets him bury his face in Saul's shoulder while he sobs.

"Hey, hey, it's okay, kid, c'mon," Saul murmurs, rubbing circles over his back.

Jesse cries harder and claws at Saul's shirt. The fairy tale is over. Their happy, promising future is gone. He ran as hard and as long as he could, but he couldn't outrun the shadow of Walter White.

In the end, he'd always known that.

Jesse swallows thickly, terror closing up his throat and making it hard to breathe. But he manages to sputter out, "I—I need a lawyer."

"Well, how convenient that you shacked up with one," Buck says, looking at Saul. "Ain't that right, Saul Goodman?"

Saul's eyes glimmer with fury, akin to how Mr. White used to look when someone threatened Jesse's life. Jesse feels a pang of fear.

"Well, are you gonna arrest us?" Saul asks. "I mean, if you're so sure we're the criminals you think we are. You presented all this in a neat little package to a judge, and he signed off on it?" Buck and Billy Ray say nothing. Saul feigns a gasp. "Oh, you mean you didn't get a warrant?" He chuckles. "Forgive me, my law's a little rusty, but I think that definitely falls under the heading of illegal. Now if you wanna be up to your ears in civil suits and TROs, hey, it's a free country, but my guess is you've got better things to do than harass your neighbors."

"We're not here to arrest anyone," Billy Ray says. "We just wanna know what happened."

"I thought you had some sort of confession tape," Saul interjects. "Which, by the way, I ought to see if you're claiming it as evidence against my client."

Billy Ray breathes out a sigh through his nose, shakes his head. "Saul, you don't wanna see that."

"I'm sure I don't, but it sounds pretty important. Gotta know what I'm up against, right?"

Billy Ray gives him a pained look. "You're sure?"

This tape could contain things Jesse's never told him. To breach Jesse's trust like this...

"No!" Jesse begs in an agonized wail. "No, you can't..." The rest of his plea catches in his throat.

Saul looks at him in anguish. "I have to, kid. I can't help you if I don't have all the facts."

Jesse whimpers, then he can't see Saul anymore through the blur of tears in his eyes.

After a moment of silence that feels like a neverending stretch of forever, Buck says, "Alright, come on over and I'll show ya."

Jesse watches them as they walk past. "You're comin' back, right?" His eyes are pleading, glistening with tears.

"'Course, kid. I always come for you." The double entendre sets Jesse at ease, if even only a little. Billy Ray opts to stay with Jesse, and Saul follows Buck out the door. "Be good," Saul says as the door shuts behind him.

Jesse blows through a couple cigarettes from his safety pack while Saul's next door. He doesn't bother going outside to smoke; he can barely stand on his shaky legs. Dread gnaws a hole in his gut and makes him nauseous. He scrubs a hand over his face, takes a drag off the cigarette whenever he feels the panic start to build. The nicotine calms him and helps him think a little more clearly.

Billy Ray's sitting across from him in the recliner, leaning forward like he's about to tell Jesse some life-altering secret. "Saul doesn't know what's on that tape, does he?" he asks softly.

Jesse shakes his head. "I don't think so. I don't know what Mr. White told him. Probably nothing...but I bet he knew some of it." Yeah, that's pretty much admitting he's not some clean-cut innocent from Alaska, but it's not like they wouldn't have figured it out anyway. Matching those fingerprints would seal the final nail in his coffin.

Jesse hiccups for air, puffing on the cigarette to ground himself. He wipes his leaky eyes with his hand. Saul might have put a couple of the pieces together about Jesse's involvement in things, but he certainly doesn't know how deep the rabbit hole goes. How much Mr. White manipulated Jesse into doing things that haunt him even now. How Jesse was so stupidly naïve and stubborn and maybe a little in love with that asshole Mr. White.

Saul's going to know everything on that tape, and Jesse's ghosts will haunt him too.

"He won't stay," Jesse whimpers out, wrapping his arms around himself like he's cold. "I don't blame him..." He looks at Billy Ray. "You saw it, right? Could you still love somebody after all that?"

Billy Ray stares down at his hands. "My uncle Ellis died when I was a kid. He wasn't old or nothin', so I was surprised, y'know, that somethin' happened. But nobody would talk about how he died. All they said was 'it was an accident.' I figure it must'a been real bad, 'cause the funeral was a closed casket."

Jesse rubs his arm, takes a long drag off the cigarette.

"But I was watchin' all the friends and family, and they didn't seem too"—Billy Ray searches for the word—"surprised about it. Like maybe he had been sick for a while. I was just a kid, so 'course I didn't know nothin'. So the years went on, and when I got to college one year, I did a paper on the Vietnam War, 'cause Ellis and a couple other guys I knew from family reunions had been in it. Figured it'd be an easy grade." He wipes his mouth with a hand, chuckles out a humorless, bleak sound and looks straight at Jesse. "You ever hear of the My Lai Massacre?"

Jesse feels his blood run cold.

"It was 1968. Innocent people: killed, maimed, tortured, worse, at the hands of a US platoon. Three to five hundred unarmed civilians, mostly women, children, senior citizens. Only the lieutenant who led the platoon was convicted, but twenty-six other soldiers were charged."

Jesse sees where this is heading. "And Ellis... He was one of 'em?"

Billy Ray nods. "So outta morbid curiousity, I looked up his obituary. It was no accident." He makes a gun with his thumb and index finger, places the barrel to his temple and clicks the trigger.

Jesse breathes out a shudder of smoke.

"I asked a couple'a family members who served in 'Nam, and they said Ellis shared his pain with them. He claimed mob mentality and pressure from the higher-ups turned him into a different person, someone he didn't even recognize. I don't know if he ever told them everything, but he said enough, probably 'cause they were war buddies, y'know. But the rest of us, we never knew. Back then, they called it post-Vietnam syndrome, but nowadays you might know it better as PTSD."

Jesse stares at the skeleton of ash growing at the end of his cigarette.

"I guess it would'a been easy to feel angry, betrayed, disgusted by what he did," Billy Ray says, "but mostly I just felt sad. Sadness for a man who couldn't live with what he'd done and thought the only way out was a bullet in his head. Sadness for all the people he'd hurt and everybody left to deal with it."

Jesse nods like he understands, because he'd thought about taking that route before. The nightmares, the lack of purpose and direction, the loss of everyone he loved... It all seemed overwhelming and impossible to bear, at least until Saul came along and filled his voids with something better.

He sighs and stubs out his cigarette in the ashtray on the coffee table. Jesse stares at the swirls in the wood. How many times did he share a pizza with Saul on this table and kick his feet up while they watched a movie together? And now they'll never get to do that again...

"This wasn't s'posed to happen," Jesse whimpers out, rubbing the back of his neck with his hands. "I just—I just wanted to start over and have a family..."

"And you deserve that," Billy Ray says, and it doesn't sound patronizing in the least. "I hate that man for what he did to you. I wish he had lived, only so we could slap the cuffs on him and bring him to justice. It's not fair what happened to you, Aaron."

Jesse sniffles.

"You prefer Aaron or Jesse?"

Jesse scoffs a harsh, bitter sound. "Are you s'posed to be the good cop?"

Billy Ray looks wounded. "There's no Good Cop, Bad Cop here. Just friends who care about you. Saul too. And I promise, Saul ain't gonna love you any less than he did when he walked outta here."

Jesse prays that he's right.

It feels like years have passed by the time the front door creaks open. Saul steps inside. His skin looks a shade or two paler than before. Jesse stands up, his heart seizing in his chest. Buck trails in behind Saul through the doorway, but Jesse barely notices.

Saul moves closer and stares into Jesse's eyes. Jesse fights the instinct to glance away, because it feels like Saul can hear his every thought and hope and dream, can fathom him inside and out. His eyes are damp with tears, his brow creased as if he's seeing Jesse for the first time.

"Do you—do you still..." Jesse manages before the words just stop in his throat.

Saul gets his arms around Jesse's waist and wraps him in a crushing embrace. He buries his face in Jesse's shoulder. Damp spots bloom from Saul's eyes onto Jesse's t-shirt. His hands curl into fists around the fabric, as if Jesse might float away if he lets go. There's a slight, shuddery quake to Saul's shoulders that Jesse pretends not to notice.

"No one will ever hurt you again," Saul murmurs at his ear. "I swear on my life, I will keep you safe."

"You still want me?" Jesse says in an impossibly tiny voice.

"I always will, kid." Saul holds on tight and doesn't let go until a few moments later. He takes a deep breath to steady himself, and Jesse takes Saul's hands in his own, squeezing them for reassurance.

Saul looks at Buck, while Jesse focuses on his new-found ally Billy Ray. "So, now what?" Saul asks. "You gonna throw the book at the kid for, what, exactly? Being abused and manipulated? Usually it's the abuser who gets the silver bracelets, but since he's rotting in the ground I guess you'll take what you can get, huh? Great police work." There's a bite to Saul's words, hostility and bitterness that wasn't there before.

Buck holds up his hands as if warding off the verbal attack. "We're not here to disrupt your lives. We think maybe Jesse—or Aaron, I guess—can help us with another case."

That slows them both down a bit. Jesse blinks, tries to process the information. "What? How?"

Saul lays a soothing hand on Jesse's lower back. "Sounds like you're trying to cut a deal, boys. You know how those work, right? He gives you information, and you make all this go away."

"What's the case?" Jesse says.

Billy Ray takes that one. "Blue Sky's still on the market. Manufactured right here in Omaha."

"And you think he has something to do with that?" Saul asks. "He showed up here after you guys did. How does that even make sense?"

"We don't think he's involved. We think he can help us find whoever's makin' it."

"I'm sorry, speaking as his lawyer, I'm still not hearing an offer that would make my client want to cooperate with you," Saul says. "And speaking as his boyfriend, I can't say I trust you two not to hold his nuts to the fire if you don't get your guy."

"Well, as his lawyer, surely you know that's how these sorts'a deals work," Buck says. "We're your friends, Saul. You're gonna have to trust us."

Saul tilts his head. "Have you ever been married?"

"What's that got to do with anything?"

"Maybe the better question is: when you wake up, who's the first person you think about? Because when you're in love with someone, and I mean the whole 'til-death-do-us-part, for-worse-and-for-better type deal, that person is always your first priority. You protect them, no matter what. You risk anything and everything to keep them safe. So, no, when it comes to him I don't trust you at all."

Jesse wipes his newly-wet eyes. All of the tragedy caused by that damn blue meth. If this is a chance to right some of the wrongs he had a hand in... Some way to atone for Gale Boetticher, Jane Margolis, Drew Sharp, and all the others who had to fall so Mr. White could rise.

"I'll help you," Jesse croaks, his voice wrecked to hell.

Saul might actually gasp out loud.

"But you gotta promise me something."

Buck asks, "What's that?" Mr. Skeptic.

"You leave Saul alone. No matter what. Alright?" Jesse says, the words cracking and breaking in his throat. "You come after him, you don't have me."

Buck and Billy Ray exchange a glance. "Sit down. Let's talk."

"What we know so far is some talented tweaker's cookin' Blue Sky here," Buck says.

Jesse shrugs like he's missing something. "So? Just arrest 'em."

"We don't know who the manufacturer is. The dealers are just street-level, and they don't deal in large enough quantities to make the arrest worthwhile. They'd never turn on their supplier when the crime ain't even a felony."

"Sounds like you got precisely Jack and Shit," Saul says.

"You wanna find these guys?" Jesse says. "It's all in the cook: are they usin' pseudo or P2P and methylamine?"

"Our lab guys broke down the crystal you were collared with," Buck says. "Some was made with pseudo, some was done through reductive amination. That was the first P2P cook we've seen in this case."

Jesse scratches his chin. "Maybe they got impatient smurfin' pseudo."

"Or they're cookin' larger-scale quantities." The tight restrictions on pseudoephedrine make it a highly improbable ingredient for a lab intent on mass production.

"You've checked the DEA watch list for any suspicious activity on the methylamine front?"

"Nothin' that raises any red flags," Billy Ray says. "Just your typical places: universities, research labs—"

That makes Jesse pull up. "Universities?"

"You know somethin'?"

"One of the guys who tried to sell to me... He showed up a while back at the shop," Jesse says. "I looked him up on Facebook. He goes to the University of Nebraska Omaha."

"If he's gettin' his chemicals through the university's supply, he can't be doin' this alone. There's too many hoops to jump through, too much paperwork that needs approval before the order even gets into the supplier's system," Billy Ray says.

"He could be payin' 'em off to look the other way."

Buck strokes his beard. "This guy got a name?"

"Brad Donovan. His phone number's in our files. I could call him, set up a meet or somethin'."

"You think he'd go for that? The guy handed you the drugs and ran away. He sounds jumpier than a virgin at a prison rodeo."

Jesse makes a face. Buck's nothing if not colorful.

"If I can put in my two cents," Saul interjects, "he also sounds like a complete amateur as far as the drug business is concerned. You don't make any money handing your product over to the first guy who looks at you funny. You want my advice? Make him an offer he can't refuse."

Jesse feels a stab of pain in his chest. "That won't get you guys anywhere. He's not gonna sell in bulk to strangers. Not if he's that skittish. You gotta be reputable. Trustworthy."

Buck's expression shifts into something Jesse can't read. "What if... You think he'd consider Heisenberg reputable or trustworthy?"

"Who cares? Guy's dead."

"Not entirely. You"—he points a meaty finger at Jesse—"know the recipe. You might as well be Heisenberg 2.0." Jesse winces at the accusation. "What if you could build a reputation with this guy by pretending to be Heisenberg?"

Saul makes a buzzing sound. "Wrong. Let me spell it out for you: we're not throwing Jesse into a lion's den. The deal was he'd give you guys information you could use, not that you could use him."

"It's a solid plan," Buck argues. "The kid knows his chemistry. He knows the ins and outs of the Heisenberg case in a way we never will. He could earn this guy's trust."

"And then what?"

"Cook with him, get him comfortable. Then we set up a sting where Jesse suggests they sell in bulk to a reputable buyer—one of our agents—and once they make the sale, bam. Case closed."

Saul's mouth twists into something angry that Jesse's rarely seen before. "You want him to do your job, basically. Christ, do you even—do you even know what happened to him in those six months after that tape was made? Because what you're suggesting—there's too many risks involved. He could relapse"—Saul lays a hand over Jesse's tattooed arm—"no offense. The guy could get spooked and move his base of operations." Saul throws a hand out. "And, hey, Jesse could be killed!"

"We have no reason to believe he's in any danger of violence."

"Yeah, well, forgive me if I don't take your word for it." Saul squeezes Jesse's wrist possessively. "Screw the deal." He rises to get up, but Buck stops him.

"Your head's on the chopping block here too, Goodman. Might be in your best interests to give this a lil' more consideration."

Jesse looks at Saul. "It makes sense," he says, and, off Saul's agonized expression, "C'mon, this isn't my first rodeo. Like he said, I know the recipe and everything."

Saul exhales angrily through his nose. "Can I have a word, please?" He pushes away from the table and leads Jesse into the laundry room. Saul shuts the door to keep their conversation relatively private. "I'm gonna go on record here and say this is a terrible idea!"

"Is that Saul the Lawyer or Saul the Boyfriend talkin'?"

"Both! Jesse, if you do this, you're going right back to the life you left behind—presumably for good. I thought you said this"—Saul gestures to the room in a way that's supposed to mean something—"was the life you wanted."

"Maybe I gotta do this to keep what we have here."

Saul's face crumbles under the weight of his words. "If this is all to protect me—"

"No. I mean, that's a hell of a bonus, but the plan makes sense. I've done this before with Fring and Mike. We went to Mexico. I cooked for the cartel, yo. This is nothin'."

"You don't know that for sure."

Jesse tilts his head. "Why do you have such a hard-on about this?"

Saul blinks a few times too many. "Because I can't lose you," he says, his voice shaky. "I won't put you in harm's way or use you to save my own ass. I can't—I won't be like him, Jesse."

Jesse gasps. "You are nothin' like Mr. White." He moves closer and takes Saul's hands in his own. "Saul, I wanna do this. I gotta try to make up for all the shit I did with him."

"You don't have to make up for anything," Saul pleads, and Jesse thinks he sees tears flooding his eyes. "He manipulated you, Jesse. The things he did... None of that's on you."

Jesse shakes his head. Mr. White might have used him, but Jesse kept coming back for more. There were plenty of times he could have—should have—stayed away for good, but instead he ran right back to what he knew best. And he hates himself for it every day.

Jesse squeezes Saul's hands with the slightest pressure. "It'll be okay, I promise."

Saul opens his mouth, closes it, perhaps seeing something on Jesse's face that quells his argument. "Don't make me have to live without you, kid." His thumbs glide over Jesse's wrist bones.

Jesse's always loved the way Saul looks at him like there's never been a more spectacular thing on this earth. But seeing him now all teary-eyed and pleading is life-altering like nothing else, because that look of adoration is still there. Saul learned that Jesse's done horrible things that would make most people recoil in horror. But he reacted with unfaltering, unconditional love.

The corner of Jesse's mouth turns up into a sad half-smile, making his scars twitch. "You still love me," he marvels. Saul, stripped of pretense and wit, is a fragile heart, clinging dearly to the one thing keeping him alive.

They are so much alike, Jesse realizes.

Saul nods weakly, his mouth trembling a bit when he bites down on words he wanted to say. He squeezes his eyes shut. Saul turns his head away. Jesse sees a tear roll down his cheek, and he brushes the wetness away with his fingers.

"Look at all the shit I've lived through," Jesse says, locking his gaze with Saul's. "This is nothing."

"Alright, let's say, best case scenario: you don't die. But it's gonna change you, Jesse. Or put you right back where you were."

"Why would I ever go back when I'm happy here? People don't start slingin' drugs because of the great health plan, yo. It's 'cause they have to. And I don't have to anymore. I got a future." He smiles despite himself. "I got you. And I won't use again 'cause I know it ain't gonna make things better." He holds Saul's gaze for a long moment. "Trust me. I'm solid."

Saul looks him over and eventually nods. "I trust you."