Disclaimer: I do not own any characters from "Sons of Anarchy." They are the property of Kurt Sutter and Fox Network. No money is changing hands in the writing, reading or distribution of this story.

Chapter 49

"God damn it!" Even through the closed house door Joss had heard Tig yell. Her stomach tightened, and she stopped spooning mashed potatoes into a bowl, setting the pot down on the counter and walking towards the garage…but not sure if she should barge out there or not. She could only think one thing; the feds…they'd somehow found out the truth about Stahl's body…that hadn't taken long…and now the club was in jeopardy, and— "Joss!" Tig yelled next, stopping the anxiety attack she was about to have. Her hand was instantly on the door, flinging it open and practically running through the screen door, what had happened? Tig was obviously going to make her part of whatever his conversation with Clay had been, but it didn't sound good.

"What's wrong?" She asked, out of breath already, expecting to see him standing with clenched fists and worried eyes, but instead, he was standing there looking a bit shaken up, like he was still trying to make sense of something. He held is hand to her, his good hand…there was blood running down from in between his wrist and thumb…what the fuck? "Tig?" She asked, because he seemed a little dumbfounded, just showing her his bloody hand like she was supposed to be able to figure it out from there. She ran the few steps over to him, cradling his hand in one of hers while her other hand supported his arm by the elbow, looking down at the blood, but she couldn't see anything, other than the red streaks that were now running into her hand as well. It was bleeding nicely, but she didn't immediately see anything that was disfiguring, no broken fingers, no missing fingers, nothing seemed to be all that serious…but something had definitely caught him off guard, there was an expression on his face that made him look nearly unrecognizable.

"I just got bit by a snake." Tig declared as Joss tried to make sense of the blood on his hand, and he sounded like he really couldn't believe that it was a statement made in first person.

What? No, he was making that up…that shit didn't really happen to people…well, it did, but come on, it wasn't that long ago in the kitchen they'd been seconds from tearing into one another; his shirt was still unbuttoned, even! And Tig was only out here, in the garage, on the phone with Clay, how the hell did any of that end with Tig being bitten by a snake? "Are you sure?"

Now he wore an expression she'd seen before, leveling his eyes at her and cocking his head. "No, I'm not," he said, exploding with a great deal of annoyance, every word dripping with panicked sarcasm. "It mighta been my exhaust pipe crawled off of the bike and came over, fucked me up, and went right back where it belongs before you got here!" He yelled, whipping his hand out of hers and gesturing spastically as he shouted. "Why the fuck would I not be sure?"

"Okay, I'm sorry!" Joss shouted back, but there was worry in her voice now…oh God, this was real? This actually happened? She reached out and took Tig's bloody hand again. "Well, what did it look like?"

"A snake!" He yelled.

Even in her worry, Joss rolled her eyes. This was like the "X" he'd taken awhile back, not having explained to her that he was trying it out, and when he'd started to act very peculiarly, even for Tig, she'd been forced to ask, "Tig did you…take something?"

"Hell yeah!" He'd responded emphatically, like leading some kind of weird cheer.

Joss had nodded, not so enthused. "And what did you take?"

"Some 'X'."

"How much 'X'?"

"All of it!"

Joss shook her head and looked up at Tig again now, trying to get him settled down, just like she'd done with the "X," and he did seem to be a little less demented about what had happened, regaining his focus…the reality of it maybe beginning to strike him in the same fearsome way it was beginning to strike her. "What color was the snake?" She'd entertained herself while he'd been on that run to Indio with long walks through the woods, had read the backyard nature book from cover to cover, and she was praying for Tig to describe the animal as being black with white bands; that would have been one of the California King Snakes, big mouth and an impressive bite, but completely harmless.

He looked down at her then both of them stared at his bleeding hand. "Kinda white-ish tan," he said, "with big brown spots all down its back."

Oh God! Joss felt herself tremble, a cold wave crashing over her, and she should have kept her damn mouth shut, but the words bounded out as her worst fear was confirmed. There was only one venomous species around their house, and God damn if it didn't look like what Tig had just described! "Oh my God, it sounds like a Western Rattlesnake!"

"What?" Tig had asked, half bending his knees now as if he suddenly felt weak. That had of course been his initial fear, that it was something poisonous, it had been Joss's initial fear as well, but she had carried some hope that it wasn't that grim a fate…but white to tan colored body with big brown blotches down its back…Shit! Tig looked at her, back to that dumbfounded, unrecognizable expression again. "Are you sure?"

But Joss didn't have time to entertain that question; luckily her wildlife book had a section about first aid for snakebites, and she was headlong into execution mode of what she'd memorized. "Tig, listen to me, this is important!" She said. "You need to be as calm as you can be right now, if you get upset and make your heartbeat faster, the venom is going to be carried around your body in no time! So take some deep breaths, try to relax." She instructed, stepping around behind him and pulling at his arm a little. "Lie down, don't move, just take it easy, okay?" She'd hoped he'd listen, she didn't have time to tell him twice, already yanking at the sleeve of the shirt she wore, ripping it off and then tearing it down the seam to make one broad piece of cloth, noticing his cellphone was sitting on the workbench and grabbing it as Tig, to her surprise, was complying with her orders, trying to find a comfortable place on the garage floor, and staying as calm as he could.

"Alright look," he said, lying back against the concrete, next to his bike, watching her with nervous and pleading blue eyes. "These last few days have really sucked shit; you and me not going so good, then I get shot, and now I'm snake-bit…" Tig looked up at her, trying to be strong, trying not to worry her, but Joss knew he was scared, who wouldn't have been? She certainly was! "So, if this is going to kill me, how long's it going to take?"

Joss gasped at his words, it was a future she wasn't willing to grace with her energies. "It's not going to kill you!" she informed him, as if stepping between him and death itself…which she'd gladly do if ever the time came…and maybe it had? No! She wouldn't think it! She knelt down behind where Tig lay on the floor, shaking with what she wished so hard against. "You're mine, I love you, God damn it! And I'm not going to let it!" She promised him, her voice betraying the fear coursing through her, taking control of this in a way that surprised her, almost like when she'd decided to kill Opie, only this time, there was no wishy-washiness. Joss didn't doubt herself; she was all fight and would accept no other outcome besides Tig living through this, and she wouldn't let him accept any other outcome than that himself! "You're too fucked up for snake venom to really have much of an effect on you, baby! You've been living with poisons a lot more toxic than this shit can even imagine in there!" Joss quickly tapped Tig's chest, noticing how he looked at her, like she was his life-line. And if he needed one, she was here! "Now, give me your hand," she ordered, putting his phone down beside her and holding the ripped shirt sleeve with both her hands, Tig raising his injury to her as she gently pulled him back against her even more, his shoulders upon her thighs as she knelt and his head just below her thundering heart. There, being reclined against her like that had to be a little more comfortable than laying flat on the concrete garage floor. "We have to get some compression on and around the bite," she explained as she took his bloody hand and stretched the knitted shirt sleeve around it, tying it just tightly enough to secure it then lay his make-shift bandaged hand down on the concrete floor. "And keep your hand below your heart," she said, grabbing his phone now. "I'm calling nine one one."

"No!" Tig twisted in protested, sitting up a little to swipe at his phone with what used to be his 'bad' arm. "I am not going back to Jax's doctor bitch!"

"Tig!" Joss shouted at him, her arms quickly wrapping around him to pull him back and hold him still, her strength crumbling a bit the more he fought her. Oh God, they needed the hospital, there was just no other chance for him! "I'm sorry, I realize how the property thing works, but I'm initiating a new clause where if you're dying, I get to make the decisions!" She was so scared! She couldn't lose Tig! How in hell had this all even happened? It wasn't fair…she'd been living with the fear of losing Tig always looking over her shoulder or so many weeks now, and then finally everything blew up and vanished it…but not for long. Here she was, about to lose him all over again, only this time, there was little she could actually do to prevent it. Oh God! Oh Jesus! Joss wanted to throw herself down and cry…but she didn't dare…she was all Tig had, and just like with Opie, she had to protect him, even from himself! But, did she have to yell at him? Shit…did she want her last words to him to be her bitchy yelling? No! He wasn't going to die! She wasn't going to let him die! She gasped and looked down at him, realizing he was looking up at her with a little more fear in his wide blue eyes than there was before…no wonder, given what she'd shouted. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean that!" She quickly said, and resumed flipping open his phone, but Tig resumed trying to sit up.

"I think I got time, let's just take your truck to the hospital in the next county!" He was saying as Joss pulled him back against her again, but he fought with her, Joss's arms going around him tighter, holding him around his shoulders, her hands unable to meet over the expanse of his broad chest.

"Tig, stop it!" She ordered, and also begged, his arms still fighting hers, both hands making fists, which pulled the knot she'd tied in the t-shirt sleeve open and the bandage popped off. Damn it! He needed compression on the bite, to stop the venom from coursing wildly through his entire arm, but she couldn't reach for it to put it back on and hold him down all at the same time…she really couldn't hold him down at all, he was too damn strong! She struggled with him for what seemed like hours, but it had only been a few seconds, his bitten hand suddenly crossing in front of her eyes…and something didn't look right. The blood had been wiped away now by both the bandage and their exertion, and under it was an "M" shaped line of little needle-like punctures…not the two wounds from hypodermic, venomous saliva delivering fangs. "Oh my God!" Joss shrieked again, only this time, it was for different reasons. "Tig, hold still a minute, please!"

Her exclamation had made him stop fighting her and he looked up at her again as she took his injured hand. "What?" He asked anxiously. "What's it doing?"

"Gopher Snake!" The words popped out of Joss's mouth as if they were an answer she wasn't able to think of in time on some game show. Fuck! Losing Tig was the biggest fear in her life, and maybe it was because it had nearly come down to that not so long ago that it had made her memorization skills fail her. But she remembered now! Gopher Snakes were the same colors and similarly marked as the Western Rattlesnakes, but they had long, tube like bodies that were the same cylindrical shape from start to finish…and, they were harmless! "Tig, did you notice if the snake had a triangular shaped head?"

"Why?" He asked back, obviously confused now, but holding still with one of her arms still wrapped around him, half afraid to move, pending her answer.

Joss looked at the bite again, just to make sure she wasn't seeing things. Nope, no fang marks, none. Also absent was the hideous purple swelling of dying cells being digested by the hemolytic venom of a Western Rattlesnake, as well as the excruciating pain that Tig would have been in by now. She sighed, closed her eyes for a moment, and let go of his hand, placing her other arm around him again…Tig, he was going to be fine! "Thank you God!" She shouted first, looking up at the ceiling then looked down at her man. "Baby, I was wrong! It wasn't a rattlesnake! That looks nothing like what a rattlesnake bite looks like, and it's not behaving at all like a rattlesnake bite!" She smiled down at him, holding him in her arms, that wouldn't have let him go for anything.

But Tig was still a tightly constricted mess in her arms. "Make up your mind, Joss!" He yelled, looking up at her like he didn't believe her…or didn't know what to believe now…she had been so sure the first time when she'd told him it was a rattlesnake…and now she was taking it back…yeah, no wonder he wasn't just accepting this and sitting up, wiping his brow with a "shooo, that was close!" kind of attitude. But then…he couldn't sit up…she was holding him, her arms were tightly around him, both of them, threaded through his arms and holding him against her, giving him a hug, but from the back and not the front…her hands clasped together over his bare chest that showed through his unbuttoned Teller-Morrow shirt…uh-oh.

"I did," she said, and tried not to sound too light hearted…letting go of him, trying not to move too quickly or too slowly in doing so in the hopes that he maybe wouldn't notice that she'd exceeded the "elbow zone." "I'm sorry, Tig, I panicked and thought the worst. But you can believe me; I know what I'm saying now." Odd, her arms were creeping away from him, setting him free, but Tig wasn't bolting up to get away from her, or freaking out because she'd had a hold of him…did he still think he was dying? "Tig, there's nothing wrong with you," she said, smiling a little now. "You're okay!"

He'd heard her, she could tell that, but he wasn't looking at her, he was watching her hands moving away off of his chest, glancing to the right and left as her arms retreated from around him, still not moving to sit up, and looking a little…God help Joss for thinking it, but disappointed. And then he did glance up at her, giving her some kind of "what the fuck?" look and then reaching for her hands that rested on the garage floor now. "Maybe I don't wanna be!" He yelled again, and grabbed both of her wrists, pulling her arms around him again, and plastering her palms against his bare chest.