Title: Hopeless And Devoted (1/?) Author: Flameboi Pairing: J/SB (who else?) Rating: R at the moment, language and violence, NC-17 in the future Archive: Yes! Feedback: Please Disclaimer: Own nothing, all Kevin Smith's and Miramax's. Summary: Part one of a 'Jay realizes shit' fic.. Read :) -------------------------------------------------------------------- Hopeless And Devoted When your career, whatever euphemism you prefer, is dealing drugs, risks are part of the package, just as vacation days and a dental plan is not; before that day, Jay had just been very lucky. Still, if asked what problems Jay could foresee possibly coming up, even in his most pessimistic moments, 'being blown away outside the QuickStop by a pissed off Pinky Delvechio' never would even have made the list, mainly because the little dork was the biggest wuss in Leonardo. Obviously, though, Pinky was feeling braver today, or else his specialness, in the short bus sense of the term, had finally caught up with him, because he was squinting from behind his horn rims down the barrel of a chrome .45 aimed dead on at Jay. Even as the blonde opened his mouth to try to talk himself out of this one, one look at Pinky's crazily determined expression told him that it was hopeless, besides which, he couldn't draw a breath, let alone speak. A moment of real life slo-mo careened through Jay's terrified brain, wondering if Bob would be all right without him, and then Jay's viscera went black as the world exploded. A desperately panicked shout of "NO!" beside Jay, drowned out by the thunder of the shot, and then the impact, slamming Jay to the ground so hard that he blacked out for a moment. Dizzy, blinking open his eyes, the clatter of Pinky's .45 falling to the ground from nerveless fingers, a groan- Jay's first thought was that being shot didn't hurt near as bad as he'd thought it would, and then, he saw. The crumpled figure in the trenchcoat laying limp on the pavement- Bob; Jay saw the blood, and knew what had happened, knew that his constant companion had saved him by diving in, by shoving him out of the way: Lunchbox had saved him by taking the bullet himself. Jay stumbled to Bob's side, kneeling, rolling him over, his hands sliding through blood both slick and sticky, and Jay screamed an hysterical demand for someone to call 9-1-1; fortunately, inside the minimart, Dante had been on the phone doing just that, since about a second after Pinky pulled out the pistol. Bob groaned, and his eyes fluttered, and Jay had never been so relieved in his life- later he would realize he'd begun sobbing as he tried to reassure Bob in a babble of words, that it'd be okay. In the second stupidest act of his life, Pinky chose at that moment to wander near, as if in disbelief of what he'd done and needing close up visual confirmation; Jay lost it, literally seeing through a blurry haze of red, leaping up and charging and tackling the asshole who'd shot Bob. Jay had gotten into plenty of fights in his life, and, thanks mostly to Silent Bob helping out when he got in over his head, hadn't lost too many, but this wasn't a fight from the moment he tackled Pinky, just a beating, Jay's fists flying while he screamed incoherently, crouched on the huddling Pinky, hitting him over and over and over. It was Randall who hauled him off, finally, when Pinky was bloodily unconscious, and Jay was trembling with limbs exhausted but too charged with adrenaline to realize it; Jay flailed and cursed and kicked the prone form at his feet, but Randall dragged him back and off, just before the first police cruiser swung into the lot, followed by the ambulance. The rest was a blur- the EMS crew doing a sort of rapid medical huddle over Bob, and getting him hooked to an I.V. and loaded into the ambulance, a semi-coherent statement to the cops about what had happened, Pinky, regaining consciousness, being cuffed and put into the back of a cruiser, Jay himself being driven to the hospital by Dante and Randal. Jay couldn't think, could barely feel, at least not much beyond the terror again, much worse than when he'd faced the pistol, nothing really present in his mind but the mantra, "Don't you dare die you silent tubby motherfucker don't you dare die and leave me don't you dare Bob," repeating over and over, his chest so tight it felt like an elephant was sitting on it. Or Bob. Bob sitting on him, pinning him during on of their mock playful fights; Jay began, quietly this time, to cry again, not a care in the world what the two clerks might think of it- all that mattered was Bob. Maybe, Bob was all that had ever really mattered.