Exhaustion hit c like a hammer blow as he stood at the tables, searching for the page with observations on traffic patterns in the vicinity of the target. The side of his head started throbbing all of a sudden, and he staggered a little under the suddenly unbearable weight of his own body. He caught himself on the table, and looked for Don, only to find him lying down by the door, wrapped in his sleeping bag. His holster was lying near his head, empty, and c knew that if he ventured closer he'd see Don's gun tucked safely and distrustfully between his shoulder and his throat.

He wouldn't venture any closer, though. Don was awake, watching him with dark, intent eyes. c nodded a little bit--he tried to smile, but his mouth just twitched awkwardly, and he didn't think the motion qualified. c tore his gaze from Don's and looked to his own sleeping bag, only then noticing that Don had set the cot back down. c's sleeping bag was spread out on top of it--folded in half, but not zipped--and there was a pillow at the end near the door, so he could have his back to the wall while lying on his right side. It would leave less than a meter between his head and Don's. He would be able to hear Don breathing, even if Don wouldn't let him lie nearer than that.

c nodded again, to nothing and no one in particular, straightened up and went to the light switch. He heard Don tensing at his feet, but merely leaned over him and shut off the overhead lights, leaving himself the work light to navigate by. When he got to his cot, he stared, stupefied, at the obstacle in his path. Lying on top of the sleeping bag was one of Don's comic books--not only one c hadn't read yet, but number 78 of a series in which he had last read number 77.

He glanced toward Don, now an indistinct shape in the shadows, and then back down at the cot, neatly made up for him, taking his comfort into consideration. Don wasn't conceding--not by a long shot--but he wasn't angry, either, or whatever cold, silent thing he'd been all day.

c picked up the comic book carefully--Don always handled them gently--flipped back the top layer of the sleeping bag and sat down on the cot. He wanted to say something, but he couldn't think of the words. Thank you, he thought, would be as inadequate as I'm sorry.

He opened the book, instead, though it was nearly too dim where he sat to make out the brightly colored pictures, and his eyes wouldn't focus well enough to take in the words. He turned the pages idly, knowing Don would hear, and then set the book down well underneath the frame of the cot, where he wouldn't seem to be rejecting it, before he lay down. He meant to listen for the sound of Don's breathing, but he was asleep before the sound of his own sleeping bag settling over him died away.

c kept quiet all through showering and brushing his teeth. When they were locked into the basement room, Don pulled out the handcuffs and said, "You want to shave?"

c hesitated a moment, meeting Don's steady gaze. Don was standing his ground on this, then. c's face itched, and he knew he had nothing to fear from Don, even if he couldn't stop his hands shaking once the handcuffs went on.

"Yeah," c said, offering his wrists, and Don nodded and cuffed him, briskly but without rushing.

c didn't think about anything but shaving as he shaved, working around yesterday's cuts and trying to ignore the weight of the chilly metal on his wrists. His own shivering was harder to ignore, but he went slowly and didn't drop anything this morning. He could hear Don walking around outside the bathroom, a welcome change from yesterday's terrifyingly absolute silence.

When he was done he stepped outside the bathroom, and Don came over quickly to take the cuffs off him. c watched Don's face as he worked the key, gathering his courage. When the cuffs were safely back in Don's pocket, Don met his eyes, and c forced a wobbly smile and said, "I, uh. I still want to have sex with you. Just so you know."

He thought he saw a flicker of something like relief in Don's eyes, but then Don was scowling at him.

"Well, I still don't, so there you go."

c nodded. "There's not really any harm in me asking, then, is there? I'll ask, you'll say no, maybe I'll argue with you about how you're repressing your feelings. It's something to do for two minutes."

Don raised an eyebrow and then glanced at his watch. "Two minutes is all you're looking for, huh?"

c couldn't help it. He laughed, right out loud, and the sound of it was so unfamiliar it even startled him. Don smiled.

"I'll take what I can get," c said, feeling giddy.

He'd made Don smile, after everything. Don liked him, and the way Don looked at him--there was something there. This had to be possible. In all this irreducible risk, there had to be some chance of reward.

"Yeah," Don said, "Well, what you can get right now is back to work."

c nodded obediently and went over to the table. After a moment spent casting about for the previous night's train of thought, he picked up the information on traffic patterns. But for the rest of the morning, the memory of Don's smile would sometimes break in on his concentration, and he'd find himself grinning helplessly at his calculations.

It hadn't even taken a whole day for Don to start missing Charlie across the stupidly small distance of the basement room. The feeling quickly went beyond altruism--though he did still want to make it better every time he saw Charlie shiver or freeze, and he'd given up on doing much of anything other than watching Charlie now. It was more than that. He wanted to touch Charlie--just touch him, not in a bad way, not like that--for his own sake.

It was weird not to touch Charlie--they'd always communicated as much by squeezed shoulders and gentle punches as anything else. You had to touch Charlie to be sure you had his attention, most of the time. And the rest of the time--God, it wasn't like it was weird. It was a normal human impulse, touching people you loved. They were brothers. Charlie didn't know that, so Charlie had drawn the wrong conclusion from Don touching him, but--well, he could explain that much, couldn't he? Even if he couldn't explain why the touches were innocent, he could tell Charlie that they were, maybe draw some kind of treaty line or something.

And not touching had to be half Charlie's problem anyway. He'd spent the last hundred and thirty-some days alone in a room with no one to touch and no one touching him except to hurt him. If that made Charlie a hundred thirty times as lonely as a single day not touching Charlie was making Don, then it was no wonder he wanted every kind of touch he could think of all at once to make up for the lack.

Charlie was at the table, shuffling through papers, when Don pushed to his feet and said, softly enough not to bug him if he was really busy, "Hey."

Charlie literally dropped everything and looked up, and it was kind of alarming to have Charlie tune in to him so instantly and entirely. Don forgot for a second what he'd been about to say, and Charlie smiled slowly as he noticed that.

"Hm?"

"I--"

He'd been going to tell Charlie about wire-cage monkeys and how he was suffering from a documented form of psychological privation, but instead Don just said, "I don't mind touching you."

Charlie blinked. "Um... Thank you?"

Don rolled his eyes. "I mean--look, I just don't swing the right way for the rest of it, but I don't mind touching you, and I know I'm probably the only person you know who touches you more than he hits you. So you're out of luck for the other thing, but--"

Charlie was smiling again, almost smugly--maybe he thought he was getting a foot in the door, and if he tried anything right now Don was going to give serious thought to just hitting him and getting it over with. Charlie tilted his head, eyeing Don thoughtfully.

"So I could say 'I need a hug,' and you would hug me?"

Don ran a hand through his hair. Trust Charlie to still make it sound weird. Somehow Don doubted talking about baby monkeys would have helped.

"Yeah, something like that."

"Okay," Charlie said, looking at him expectantly.

Don stood still, looking back and waiting, until Charlie's self-assured smile slipped a fraction.

"I need a hug?" Charlie's lips were still curled up but his voice was almost plaintive.

Don crossed the space between them quickly--from the door to the chalkboard, just like he'd wanted to do that very first minute and most of the ones since. He wrapped his arms around Charlie and hugged him tight. Don felt Charlie freeze and started to back off--fuck, if he couldn't stand lying in a zipped sleeping bag, being bear-hugged wasn't going to feel too reassuring--but then Charlie's hand settled tentatively on his back. It was Don's turn to hold perfectly still. Charlie's arms slowly circled him and then tightened, and Charlie was holding on right back.

Don thought he should probably let go at some point, or he was going to give Charlie all the wrong ideas all over again. But it felt so right, hugging Charlie, being close to him, Charlie hugging him right back with the fierce, unexpected strength of his skinny arms. Don turned his head a little, just enough that his cheek brushed the softness of Charlie's hair, and then he did force himself to let go, stepping back quickly.

He met Charlie's eyes, not at all sure what to say. Charlie was hugging himself, like once his arms got the idea they didn't want to stop. He tilted his head and smiled, and said, "I do still want to have sex with you, though."

Don had to smile. It was almost as funny as it was disturbing, how much this was like Charlie's great Send Me To Princeton campaign when he was twelve, and every day Charlie dared to argue with him was another day Charlie learned to trust him.

"Yeah," Don said. "Well, so do lots of people."

Don was sitting by the door, drinking his coffee and blinking under the overhead lights, which had been on for a couple of minutes now. c, who'd been up for hours before the appearance of breakfast, stood by chalkboard six and sipped his own coffee, watching Don. The right word for the phenomena he'd been observing came to him all at once--in a flash just like any other breakthrough--and c only wondered if he shouldn't mention it as his mouth opened and the words fell out.

"I love you."

Don's head snapped up and he looked absolutely blank for a few seconds, still blinking, like his eyes hadn't adjusted enough to focus on c three meters away. Then he scrubbed a hand over his hair and his shoulders slumped. He looked down at his coffee but didn't drink any more of it, and said in a quiet, tired voice, "No, you don't. You have Stockholm Syndrome."

c frowned. He tried the word Stockholm a time or two, but all he could come up with was Nobel prizes, and the fact that there wasn't one for Mathematics. But Don said it like he ought to know it, and c hadn't anticipated this sort of counterargument. He was pretty sure he didn't have whatever it was, if it meant he didn't actually love Don, but he didn't want to assert that when he didn't know how Don could disprove it.

"Stockholm Syndrome," Don repeated, and when c looked up he was still staring at his coffee. He sounded oddly defeated, for a man sure of his argument. "It happens when one person has power of life and death over another, and the endangered person feels loyalty and sympathy toward the person who holds power over them. It's a natural self-protective response."

c rolled his eyes. "Well, then you might have a point, if I'd said I love your boss, but I didn't say that. I love--"

"Do not say that again."

Don looked up, looked straight at c, so fierce that c's next argument, the one about how he wasn't actually afraid of Don, died in his throat. Don pressed his lips together, and his glare faded to something a little less paralyzing.

"It won't help your case," he said more quietly, and c nodded.

Don looked away, and c turned back to his boards, flipping the chalk between his fingers. He didn't last long before his eyes slid back to Don, studying the curve of his shoulder, the tight lines of his hands on the coffee mug. "If you'd prefer something less sentimental..."

Don snorted. "I'd prefer you to be quiet."

He took another sip of his coffee and swiped a hand over his face while c stood still, watching, trying to switch his brain back to math from Don. He was more distracting than almost anything.

Don finally looked up and saw him watching. He rolled his eyes and said, "Sure, go ahead. Set yourself up, I'll shoot you down."

c smiled, though he knew he shouldn't, really. He cleared his throat and tried to keep an appropriately straight face as he said, "Well, it's just that you're pretty much the last person on earth, as far as I'm concerned."

Don frowned, though there was a smile lurking in his eyes, like he thought c was kidding. It was a good smile; c wished he'd earned it.

"Last? You've never even met a woman as far as you know. I'm more like the first. There'll be somebody else, c. Lots of somebodies."

c shrugged and looked away, toward blackboard seven, where he occasionally worked out his own private calculations. It was blank now, but he remembered the numbers.

"First and last aren't mutually exclusive under sufficiently constrained conditions." He glanced toward Don, and found him squinting in his direction. Don didn't get it yet.

"I've calculated my own life expectancy," c explained patiently. "It's not great."

Don flinched at that, eyes going wide, looking much more pole-axed than somebody who'd almost killed him should at the idea of him dying.

"Don, this isn't exactly a line of work that predisposes anybody to dying of old age."

Don set down his coffee on the floor with what seemed like excessive care, and got to his feet. He walked slowly over to c, his steps deliberate, his eyes betraying the same weird intensity he'd shown c in the very first moment they met. Even as he fought the urge to back away from Don's advance, c thought, You do want me, I know you want me, I may be brain-damaged but I'm not blind.

Don stopped less than a foot from c, holding his gaze, and said in a low, steady voice, "Williamson hired me to guard you, c. Not because he thinks you're going to bust out of here armed with chalk and your giant brain. He wants you kept safe."

c blinked, frowning and lowering his gaze to Don's collarbone. It was an interesting point.

"That must mean he thinks people other than himself might try to kill me. I hadn't factored that into my life-expectancy calculation before, I don't think it really impr--"

Don caught his arm in a tight grip, and the words failed in c's mouth as he met Don's eyes again. He resisted the urge to pull away from the restraint, and Don's other hand settled on his shoulder.

"c," Don whispered, and the hair stood up on the back of c's neck. "It is my job to keep you in one piece. I intend to do my job."

c nodded slowly, transfixed, and cautiously raised his own hand to Don's arm. "You take--your job--seriously. I get that."

Don's mouth flattened to a grim line, and c knew it wasn't a job that Don was staring at like his hope of heaven. It wasn't a job that Don was holding on to tightly enough to hurt. c knew the word for what Don was doing here, too, though he had a feeling he wouldn't get too far saying it.

Don nodded and took his hands away, easing back a step and finally dropping his gaze. c turned back to his board and tried to catch his breath. He rolled the chalk on his fingers, listening to the small sounds of Don walking away, though staying always, always, between c and the door, and thought, You don't want to say it, but you fucking well love me too.

Don scrubbed his hands over his face. He wished he couldn't believe they were arguing about this, but it was so Charlie it was killing him.

"Fine," he said. "What if I was--what if I was sick? And if--"

"If we had sex," Charlie filled in. He'd noticed at some point that Don never said it and had started supplying the words, which didn't really help at all.

Don took a deep breath, in and out. "You'd get sick, and I don't want to do that to you."

"Safe sex doesn't mean no sex," Charlie announced confidently, licking his fingers for the last traces of his sandwich. "We'd just have to be careful. Depending on what you had, except that you don't have anything, or you wouldn't say what if."

Don sighed and leaned his head back against the wall, setting down his own half-eaten sandwich on the floor. "Right, but--look, it doesn't even matter why not. I don't want to, I'm not gay." He glanced at Charlie just as he opened his mouth, and rolled his eyes. "Or bisexual, okay? I don't have sex with guys."

Charlie shrugged. "If you haven't, that doesn't necessarily mean you won't. People do weird things when their options are limited, and you don't get out much more than I do."

Don glanced involuntarily up at the door, then scowled at Charlie. "I don't care how little I get out," Don said. "The answer's still no."

Charlie tilted his head. "It doesn't have to be--I mean, if you don't want to perform some particular act--"

Don squeezed his eyes shut, far too late to stop the barrage of mental images. Charlie would insist on negotiating about oral sex or anal or something else and Don couldn't help seeing it. Charlie naked, Charlie standing over him, Charlie on his--

He regretted the half of his sandwich he had eaten, and clenched both fists against his thighs. He couldn't move. He would not hit Charlie.

"It's not--" Don gritted out. "No."

c blinked in the dimness, half awake. He only had to turn his head a little to find Don, sitting in the corner between blackboard five and blackboard six, reading a comic book under the work light. c rubbed his eyes and glanced above Don's head at the boards, remembering the stalled line of reasoning that had compelled him to lie down and, as Don would say, give his brain a break. No immediate avenues for progress leapt to mind; his mind, in fact, didn't leap much of anywhere. He was warm and comfortable, lying on his cot, wrapped in his sleeping bag.

He must have moved, because Don looked up at him, and nodded slightly when he met c's eyes.

"What time is it?" c murmured, squirming around, trying to stretch without sticking any body parts outside his sleeping bag.

Don squinted at his watch. "Four forty-seven. In the afternoon."

c nodded and stayed where he was, raising his left hand to probe along the healing cut beside his eye. The scab had come off in the shower today, and the skin beneath was closed up, a dark pink line more than a centimeter long. Don had winced when he saw it, but c couldn't stop checking it out, the new scar smooth under his fingertips. He made the same stroking motion with his right hand, tucked between his thighs for warmth, and then slid it higher, cupping himself.

"Don," he said, "would you like to have sex with me?"

Don didn't look up from his comic book. "No, c."

c shifted his fingers, squeezing a little. He hadn't jerked off since a while before Williamson brought Don to stay with him, though he didn't know when exactly. He'd gone through a couple of phases when he did it all the time, locked up alone, as much for something to do as because it felt good. The work light shone down on the top of Don's head and his shoulders, lighting him up with the yellow of the incandescent bulb, showing the brown in the darkness of his hair. He was staring intently at the page before him, and as c watched, the tip of Don's tongue emerged to touch the corner of his mouth. c licked his own lip, sweeping his thumb across his dick through his sweatpants in mirror of the motion.

He cleared his throat and said, "Please?"

Don did look up then, and smiled a little as he said, "No, thank you."

c smiled back, warmth pooling in his belly, spreading lower. "You're perfectly welcome."

Don's smile widened, and he shook his head and returned his attention to his comic book.

c kept as still as he could, watching Don, moving his hand minutely as his dick hardened under the touch. He couldn't do much more, with his right arm under him, and after a while he needed to touch himself more than he wanted to keep watching Don. Moving as slowly and quietly as he could, c rolled over, twisting the sleeping bag around himself, kicking to free his feet from their tangle and then to get them covered up. Soon enough he was lying on his left side, his head gingerly resting on the pillow--Don's pillow. His face was to the wall and his right hand was free.

He closed his eyes, listening for any sound behind him, waiting until he heard the usual rustling of Don's comic book pages. Then c slid his hand down into his pants, spreading his fingers wide, letting his palm skim over his own hot, taut skin. He kept breathing as evenly and silently as he could through his mouth as he touched himself, but he shuddered at the first brush of fingertips, his breath stopping in his throat, his balls tightening. He wanted to hurry, but he couldn't, not with Don just across the room, four meters behind his back.

c pressed his mouth against the pillow to muffle the sound of his breathing as he stroked himself. He moved slowly, not even closing his hand, just dragging his fingers up and down. He felt too hot under his sleeping bag, sweat breaking out everywhere. He was nearly panting, electric pleasure building in his groin. c ground the side of his face down, waking a twinge of pain from the fresh scar and fading bruises, and it steadied him enough to take his next breath smoothly, sliding his thumb around the head of his cock. His hips jerked at that, and he tightened his hand hard around himself and didn't move, listening to the silence behind him. He didn't even breathe.

c kept still as long as he could, but he didn't last. His dick jerked first, irresistibly seeking friction, and only then did he take another breath. He loosened his grip and stroked himself quickly, once, twice--the dry friction would start to hurt soon if he didn't stop, but he didn't want to stop--and then there was a burst of sound from behind him and c froze.

It was static, he realized, once the first instant of blind panic passed and the sound continued. He pulled his hand out of his pants and turned, propping himself on his right elbow but keeping his hips turned toward the wall, to see the source of the sound: Don's walkie-talkie, probably tuned to an empty channel and turned all the way up. Don was holding it against his right ear. He'd turned so that his right side was nearer to c, his face toward the corner. Don's right wrist shielded his eyes, but c could make out Don's blood-drained knuckles, the tensed muscles of his jaw.

Not watching. Not listening. But not leaving, either, and not making c stop. Letting him have this. c closed his right hand around the wooden edge of the cot, holding on as he watched Don, drinking in the sight of him. He didn't often have a chance to really look at Don anymore, but now there was only an infinitesimal probability of Don catching him at it. He stared, his heart racing and his breath coming short, his cock as hard as ever with Don only a few meters away. c raised his left hand and licked his palm, then slid his hand into his pants.

He couldn't keep himself from gasping as he closed his hand tight around himself and took the first stroke, but it was all right. Don wouldn't hear. c's eyelashes fluttered, but he kept his eyes open, watching Don. He stroked himself roughly, awkwardly, inside his pants and with his wrong hand. Maybe it would feel like this if it were Don's hand on him, if Don turned and looked, stood and came over here, if he leaned over the cot and touched--

He squeezed his eyes shut for a second, closed his hand painfully tight on himself, holding back his orgasm for just a little longer. When he opened his eyes again he only looked at Don in pieces: the curve of his shoulder, he muscle of his forearm standing out, his hair standing in unruly waves, the softness of his throat just under his jaw. c's hand kept moving, dragging it out, so good, so good--and then Don moved.

He turned his head, dropped his wrist a little, peeking at c from the corner of his eye, and c felt his own eyes go wide as Don's did, like looking in a mirror as their gazes met. c's head tipped back and his eyes clenched shut and he was coming hard under his own touch, under Don's eyes, his hips jerking, making the cot thump erratically against the wall as the static kept playing.

He stayed still for a minute, catching his breath, eyes closed and head hanging back. The first thing he noticed was that his fingers hurt--his right hand was going almost numb from clutching the frame of the cot. c let go, and then let himself flop back flat on the cot, his left hand still curled around his dick in the wet heat of his boxers. He was going to have to clean that up in a minute. The static washed over him, steady and ever-present as Don himself, and c kept his eyes closed a while longer, drifting. He could feel himself smiling, and he didn't want to stop.

Don kept still as long as he could, and when he couldn't keep still anymore he jumped to his feet and started to pace, from the chalkboard to the door and back again. He kept his chin tucked, though he switched the radio back to the standard channel and jammed it into his pocket. There was no sound from the direction of Charlie's cot, but Don wasn't going to make the mistake of looking again. His hands were in fists, painfully tight, every muscle vibrating with the need to throw a punch. He kept his arms folded, his knuckles pressed against his biceps, bone grinding slowly, implacably, against tensed muscle.

He walked fast, stiff-legged, and after the first few turns he shut his eyes. There was nothing to see, no obstacle to navigate, and he knew the dimensions of the room like he knew the bounds of his own body. The absence of sight made him more conscious of the quiet of the room--there was just the sound of his own steps, the faint ringing in his ears from his clenched jaw, and the hiss of his own breath. No sound from Charlie.

His stride lengthened and sped until he was nearly running, back and forth in the tiny space, from the wall to the door, the wall to the door, cinder blocks and locks, keeping him in here with Charlie. He must not hit Charlie, must not move one inch closer to Charlie than he already was.

When he heard movement Don forced himself to be still, standing halfway from the door and facing the wall. He forced his hands open, pressing his palms to the cinder blocks between two chalkboards. Behind him he could hear the rustling of Charlie's sleeping bag, and he tried to focus on the cool painted brick under his hands. He flexed his fingers and tried to force the muscles of his arms to release their tension. Don found himself pushing instead, pressing against the wall with his feet braced, like he could just shove his way out of here, straight through brick and earth.

He heard the quiet scuff of Charlie's feet, moving hesitantly toward him. He knew he had to say something before Charlie got into arm's reach, but he hadn't managed to unclench his teeth before Charlie said, "Don?" from about six feet behind him.

Charlie's voice was small, tentative, and Don could almost picture his wide eyes--flashing wider, dark and shining in the half-light--

"Don't," Don snapped. He wasn't even sure whether he was talking to himself or Charlie, but he could hear the sudden silence of Charlie freezing in place behind him, not moving away. On Don's next breath he could smell sex, rising warm off Charlie's skin, and his heart was racing, his fingers curling in against the brick.

"Get away from me, c."

Charlie still didn't move, didn't say a word, but Don could hear him breathing now, low and fast. Don turned his head just a fraction, keeping his eyes closed so there was no danger of seeing Charlie.

"I've already had my hands around your neck once," he said flatly, and that got Charlie moving. Don pressed his forehead hard against the cinder block and listened to Charlie retreating all the way to the bathroom. The water switched on as soon as he got there, covering all other sounds, but Don didn't move. It was easier to control himself if he didn't move at all.

It wasn't like he'd never hit Charlie before he got here--Charlie had hit the height of nine-year-old obnoxiousness just when Don hit the low point of fourteen-year-old impulse control, for starters--but he couldn't remember ever wanting to this badly. He'd never closed his eyes and entertained the vision of pounding on Charlie until he stopped talking, stopped arguing, stopped looking at him like that.

He thought he was imagining it when he heard the bar lift outside the door, just because he so desperately wanted to hear it. When the lock turned, Don bolted toward the door and grabbed his duffle. By the time Williamson pulled the door open Don was standing on the threshold, and he brushed past the boss with barely a glance, running up the stairs two at a time.

There was no one in the kitchen, and Don thought for a ludicrous instant that he should eat, and then he dropped his bag and headed through the doorway to the living room. There were two guys on the couch, Sam and one of the others, but Don barely saw them. He didn't break stride until he reached the front door. He opened the deadbolt, the lock, and the lock on the storm door, and stepped out into fresh, cold, open air.

Don hesitated for an instant on the threshold, staring out into the night, but when he heard someone get off the couch behind him he took off again. He crossed the porch in two quick strides and jumped over the steps, and then he was running flat out, long strides all the way down the lawn to the ditch beside the road and then veering around to the gravel driveway. Open air and space around him, and he was moving at last. He could keep running forever if he wanted to, except that Charlie was back there--so he couldn't go anywhere.

He couldn't bear to take a single step back toward the house. From here it looked so fucking normal, lights golden behind the curtains at the windows, and no one would know to look at it what happened in the basement.

Don turned on his heel, putting his back to the house. He bent and picked up a handful of gravel, cupping the stones in his left hand, picking them out one at a time to shy at the line of trees that marked the edge of the property. The moon and stars and the glow of the house gave enough light to see the occasional strike of a pale stone against a dark trunk, bouncing off into the grass. He kept throwing until he started to feel the cold, fingers going numb and shoulder stiffening, and then he brushed the rock dust off on the seat of his pants. When he turned, Sam was there, standing a little way up the driveway. Don nodded and started back up to the house.

He heard Sam click on a radio. "Never mind, he's coming in."

Don gritted his teeth at that, trying not to show the wince. He'd have been dead as soon as he stepped foot on the road--or Charlie would. Don didn't pause at the door, grabbed his duffle from the kitchen floor and went on to the bathroom as Sam locked up behind them.

He didn't wait for the water to warm up, stepped under the icy spray and washed fast, scrubbing everywhere like he was covered in mud, or blood, or anything he could ever wash off. When the water started getting hot he shut it off, and stepped out shivering. He got dried and dressed and shaved without looking at the mirror. It hadn't fogged up.

There was a pot of soup on the stove, and Don dished some up and wolfed it down, standing right there. He was starving as soon as he put food in his mouth. He rinsed his bowl and spoon when he was done and put them both in the dishwasher, grabbed his duffle and headed down the basement stairs without hesitating. He got to the bottom and was reaching for the door before he thought better of barging back in there to--what? Punch back in? Tell Williamson how much he loved his job? Hit Charlie, because that would solve everything or anything?

Don sank to sit on the stairs, resting his head in his hands. It had been stupid to run like that. He shouldn't have risked Charlie, doing something that obvious, shouldn't have gone so far he couldn't hear what Williamson was doing to Charlie down here. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

He pressed his thumbs against his temples, tried to think of something more helpful than that--he heard Terry's voice all of a sudden, as clear as if she'd plunked down on the step beside him, telling him he was burned out and it was a natural response and he needed to cut himself a little slack before he self-destructed. He smiled bleakly at his feet. He was pretty sure he'd already self-destructed; it had just taken a little while for the shockwave to hit.

The door opened and Don straightened up sharply. Williamson was standing astride the threshold, and waved him inside. Don nodded, trying to look stolid and reliable and only interested in doing the job he was, theoretically, getting paid for. He picked up his bag and made to step inside past the boss, but Williamson stopped him there, just inside, with a hand on his shoulder. Don froze at the touch, looking automatically into the room for Charlie. He was standing by one of the chalkboards, holding the chalk stationary against the slate. Only pretending to work, and not pretending very hard, at that.

"Mac, man, I'm sorry," Williamson said, and Don turned his head and stared blankly at Williamson's oddly genial smile.

"I didn't even think of how much time you actually spend on shift with this gig when I was working out your schedule. So you'll get a day off tomorrow. Jimmy'll come down at eight and let you out. Take you into town for the day."

Don felt his mouth open and shut it firmly. He nodded, and didn't bother trying for a smile. Williamson smiled wider, wide enough for both of them, squeezed his shoulder too hard, and shoved him inside. Don stumbled a step and then froze, listening to the door being barred behind him. He stared at Charlie's back, and watched him drop his chalk, watched him press both hands flat against the board and lean his forehead on it, watched him begin to cry in perfect silence, betrayed only by the shaking of his shoulders.

Don took two quick strides into the room.

"c," he said, and all his anger, everything he'd felt but the need to take care of Charlie, was wiped blank by this. He couldn't even grasp--they had until eight tomorrow morning and then what? Williamson had realized who he was and wanted to kill him after all? But why wait, why not do it here and now in front of Charlie for maximum effect? Or else he wanted Don out of the way for a while, private time with the genius...

Charlie probably had a better idea than Don did of what to expect, and Charlie was crying.

"c..."

He got close enough to touch Charlie's arm, his fingers brushing the sleeve of Charlie's sweater at his elbow, and then Charlie was moving away from him, pushing off the board with both hands, shaking his head and swiping a hand across his face.

"I have to work," Charlie said. "I have to--I won't get anything done tomorrow, I'll be useless, I have to work while I can."

He was still crying, his voice shaking, tears pouring down his face, but the hell of it was he was right. Charlie had to work. And if he could only work with Don there--if he felt safer, felt saner, felt anything that helped him get through the next few hours--then Don had to give him that.

"All right," Don said slowly. "All right. I'll go read. You work."

Charlie looked up at that, meeting his eyes. His eyelashes were spiky with tears, his face was wet, he was shaking, and he was staring at Don like he'd never seen him before. Like he didn't want to forget him. Then Charlie nodded and said, "Thank you," and turned to get another piece of chalk from the box.

Don was lying down by the door, but he wasn't even pretending to sleep. All the lights were still on, and every time c looked in his direction, Don was looking back. Watching him.

c never asked him the time. While he worked, he couldn't feel it sliding away from him, but whenever he surfaced he knew it was gone. He didn't want to know how much, how little remained to them, but the question wormed its way to the front of his mind until it blocked all else. He stood still, frustrated, at the corner between boards two and three, looking at neither. If this had happened during a computational phase he could have gotten through it, but the conceptual work was too stop-and-start, required too much complex thought and redirection, and the anticipation of eight o'clock dragged at him, distorting everything. Williamson had given Don to him, and now Williamson was taking him away--for a day? Forever? c didn't think Williamson had ever bothered to lie to him, but he might lie to Mac.

Behind him, Don said, "c, it's three in the morning."

c turned, nodding, trying not to think of how Don knew exactly when to interrupt him. Don was sitting up, looking at him, and c wanted to say I need a hug but he didn't think he could get the words out, remembering Don's tensed shoulders, Don's growled get away from me, Sam's voice on Williamson's radio saying Mac had taken off running.

c shut off the work light, instead, and Don said quietly, "I've got the overheads."

c nodded and stumbled to his cot, wrapping himself in his sleeping bag as the lights went out, and it was so ordinary, so exactly like every day since Don had come here, so entirely unlike everything before. He pressed his face into the pillow and tried not to think of tomorrow, not nearly as unknown as he could wish. Today, really. Five hours and counting. Williamson might kill Don, or just take him away and never bring him back. c thought the probability of either was equal. And almost certainly, whatever reason they had for taking him away, Williamson would want to talk to c about it. To Know-Nothing.

He turned onto his side, his back to the wall, and listened for the sound of Don breathing. It was there, steady and familiar and nearly close enough to touch. c squirmed over onto his stomach, resting his chin on the pillow and straining forward, reaching out with his right hand, fingers splayed, in the direction where Don lay. His hand dangled in the air, touching nothing, getting cold.

c whispered, "Don."

He heard motion, and then he felt it. First there was just a movement of air near his hand, and then Don's fingertips grazed his palm. He reached spasmodically after the contact and Don's hand closed around his, warm and strong.

"Yeah," Don whispered back. "I'm right here."

c held on tight. He lay awake for a long time, and he never felt Don let go.