For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.

Here's a couple things you might need to know, or maybe you just forgot: Casey sends a video of Downy playing with a laser to Ellie, who is having a miserable day at work.

Foreshadowing

He was beyond tired. Bone weary was more like it. He sat on the folding chair, his long legs stretched out in front of him, propped up on the table. His left hand covered his face. His right arm was pulled tight against his stomach. It had been the longest week ever.

The flight to China had been miserable. He was tired of the cramped quarters of flying coach, but it was the government's dime and he felt honor-bound to remain quiet about the lingering pain in his knees, back and neck from being shoehorned into the seat.

The mission had been a complete disaster from start to finish. It was like something out of one of those old Keystone Kops movies. Everywhere they turned, everything they did, it only seemed to make the situation worse.

After the first incident, he blamed Sarah for the remaining troubles as she'd been the one to ask: "What else could possibly go wrong?" Chuck was almost arrested for some obscure law Casey still didn't understand. Sarah managed to sprain her ankle. And Casey had nearly been shot twice, including one friendly fire incident from the Intersect's weapon. Chuck had picked up a loaded, live, real gun only to turn it around and beat someone in the head with it and, in the process, managed to somehow squeeze the trigger. Casey'd had to roll into a stone wall to avoid the shot and had done something to his right arm in the process.

To top that off, after another shoehorned flight back home, there was inventory to do at the Buy More. And given Casey's height and muscular advantage over the majority of the other green shirts, he wound up doing most of the heavy lifting. Which did his arm absolutely no good whatsoever.

So, when he'd strolled into the laundry room a little early, he barely acknowledged Downy's presence, went ahead and started his first load as usual before trying to get comfortable.

The cat sat perfectly still, looking up at her human owner. She tilted her head to one side curiously. When the door opened and Ellie walked in, Downy rushed to meet her, meowing softly.

"Hey, you," she said, walking carefully to avoid stepping on her little paws or her tail. She looked up at Casey who liked like crap. "John...?"

He slowly lowered his hand.

She could see, very clearly, his left eye was solid black. "Not again."

"It's a hard knock life."

"This wasn't because of Chuck, was it?" she asked, putting her hamper down and immediately crossing towards him.

Partially, he wanted to tell her. "I had a misunderstanding with a refrigerator." In his head, he added, of a man. The guy he'd tangled with in Beijing had been built like one.

"Sounds like a worker's comp claim," she said, her fingers light and cool to the touch on his bruised skin. "Buy More is paying for this, aren't they?"

"Pretty sure my face is paying for it," he said, looking up at her, realizing just how close she was.

"I'll go get ice."

He caught her wrist before she could do more than stand up straight.

"You don't want it to stay puffy and dark, do you?"

"You don't have to take care of me, too. Between Downy, Chuck, Devon, your patients at the hospital..."

"Getting you an ice pack doesn't really qualify as taking care of you."

"On what planet?"

"On this one."

Casey slowly lowered his legs from the table, grunting in annoyance at the pain as he did so, before standing. The whole time, he still had a warm hand around her wrist. "You've barely slowed down for two minutes since you lost your patient last weekend."

"So?"

"So stop."

"Stop what?"

"Stop trying to be Wonder Woman."

"But, I like my invisible plane..."

"Ellie, I mean it. You don't have to take care of me."

"What if I want to?"

"Why would you want to do that? Why add another responsibility to your already full plate?"

"Because you..." She looked up at him, caught in his blue eyes for a moment. She swallowed hard. "Because you need ice."

"I'm fine without it."

"But, you would be better with it."

"In the long run, it's not going to make that much difference."

"But..."

He moved closer to her, invading her space, looking down at her, still holding onto her wrist. His voice was low, dangerous almost. "But I want you to take care of you."

She closed her eyes as she shuddered. A feeling she couldn't adequately describe coursed through her veins. Intrigue? Desire? "I'll be fine..."

"And so will I," he assured her.

"It'll just take a minute."

Downy meowed, unhappy that they were standing, that they weren't sitting where she could crawl all over them.

"Please," Ellie said, looking up at him. She realized it wouldn't take much to close the distance between them.

He was torn. Half of him wanted the tenderness, the comfort he knew she could provide. The other half knew he had to stay strong, that, out of the two of them, she was the one who needed the assistance. All of him, however, couldn't seem to help but react to how close she was. He tried to blame the pain, the fact that his head was swimming on the tussle alone, that his heart was beating faster because he'd been remembering the fight. But he knew, deep down, it wasn't true. He knew, deep down, it was because of her. "I'll get it," he finally grit out.

She turned on her heel, watching as Casey breezed past her, finally releasing her. She felt conflicted at the sudden loss of contact, at his walking away from her. She let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding. She dizzily dropped down into a chair.

Downy jumped into the chair beside her, looking up at her.

Ellie reached out, slowly placing a hand on the cat's head. "What was that?" she asked.

Stay tuned...