The bad guy pointed his gun at the lean, handsome, blond, green-eyed, black-clad gunslinger (that would be Chris Larabee) and fired, then fired again, hitting him (Larabee) twice and hurting him. Bad.

Oh, there was blood everywhere!! It was just terrible! Larabee gave a shocked, hoarse, harsh, wordless cry of intense, really bad pain and went down in a blood-soaked heap on the floor, making those grunts of pain that just send willies up the spines of Larabee lovers everywhere. His sculpted jaw clenched and the green eyes glittered with intense, really bad pain.

The bad guy laughed at his triumph over the lean, handsome, blond, green-eyed, black-clad gunslinger (Larabee), but his triumph -- and his evil, maniacal, typically bad-guy laughter -- was short-lived as five of Larabee's fellow peacekeepers filled him with lead and the sixth, the healer, threw a knife into him on his way to see about the badly-hurt Larabee. Then the long-haired, blue-eyed tracker stepped on the dying bad guy on his way to see about Larabee.

Nathan (the healer), threw himself at Larabee's side and started to wring his (the healer's, not Larabee's) hands in worry. The long-haired, blue-eyed tracker looked at the healer and, in his soft, throaty, raspy Texas drawl, asked, "How is he, Nathan?"

"I don' know," Nathan (the healer) answered, worry, fear and a smidgeon of guilt in his voice. "I ain' no doctor. Mebbe if I was a doctor..."

The long-haired, blue-eyed tracker cast his worried, soulful gaze down at the bleeding, really hurting man who was more than a brother to him, who was the other half of his soul, in other words, his best friend. "It's my fault!" he moaned strickenly.

Nathan looked up at him in surprise. "How you figger that?"

Vin (the long-haired, blue-eyed tracker) looked at Nathan and shrugged. "I don't know. Jist seemed like somethin' I should say."

"Ooohhhhhh..." moaned Larabee, his lean, handsome face contorting into a mask of really bad agony. Blood continued to well from his wounds.

"Let's git him up ta the clinic," Nathan ordered, hoping against hope that his limited skills would be enough to save the leader of the Seven and thus save the Seven from becoming... well, the Six.

Buck Wilmington, ladies' man, scoundrel, Larabee's oldest friend (and the man who'd known Larabee longer than anyone else there) stepped forward and gently, tenderly and with great care and affection, gathered the lean, handsome, hurting, bleeding gunman into his arms and cradled him to his broad chest, then carried him out of wherever it was they were when Larabee got shot and took him up all those stairs to Nathan's clinic, then laid him gently, tenderly and with great care and affection onto the bed (man, that's a long sentence even for me!).

Nathan stepped forward and began removing Larabee's blood-soaked clothes, having to wade through a crowd of women that had suddenly materialized to do it. One of the women was carrying a hockey stick, though, so he pretty much left her alone. Once the clothes had been removed, he bent over the shot gunslinger, took out all those really nasty-looking tools he carried everywhere (because these guys were always getting shot, or stabbed, or beaten, or various combinations of all three), and began probing for the bullet. Excuse me, bullets.

Larabee, lying naked and bleeding on the bed, writhed and moaned and made more of those Larabee-in-pain sounds, then feverishly began to call for Sarah and Adam, his wife and son who'd died in a house fire about three years previously at the hands of either Cletus Fowler or Ella Gaines or some combination thereof, depending on whichever scriptwriter viewers chose to believe. The long-haired, blue-eyed tracker (Vin) took a cool, wet cloth and gently bathed his brother-best friend-soulmate's fevered, naked and bleeding flesh (again having to fight through the crowd of women to do it and, like Nathan, pretty much letting the hockey-stick wielding one do whatever the hell she wanted to). Then he began to speak to Chris in his soft, throaty, raspy Texas drawl.

"Chris, cowboy, pard, Larabee, ya cain't leave us now!" he implored, his whole heart and soul in his voice and really big, beautiful, pain-filled, soulful blue eyes. "We need ya... Hell, I need ya! I ain't had a fam'ly since my Ma died of putrid fever when I's jist five. Yer all I got. What'll I do if ya die? How will I ever clear my name of that murder charge I got hangin' over me? Ya promised ta go back ta Tascosa with me. Ya gotta live, cowboy! Yer my brother, my best friend (even if Buck has known you longer, but you and me got this connection, bein' able ta speak without words, which apparently you and him never had). Hang on, cowboy! Please!"

Through the fever and the intense, really bad pain and the blood loss, that soft, throaty, raspy Texas drawl reached into Larabee's clouded mind. Despite the terrible pain, fever and weakness from blood loss, he lifted a pale, shaking, unsteady, weak hand and clasped it to the long-haired, blue-eyed tracker's (Vin's) forearm in the familiar forearm clasp that was theirs alone (again, something he and Buck had never shared). From the depths of his intense, really bad pain, he opened his eyes, looked into his best friend-brother-soulmate's dusty, unshaven and incredibly square-jawed face and summoned the will to live.

"I... won't... die," he promised in a weak, pain-filled voice.

Nathan removed the bullets and patched up the lean, naked, blood-soaked body, then cleaned off the blood, leaving Larabee merely lean and naked. And again drawing that crowd of women. Then the healer raised dark, deep, soulful, worried, gentle brown eyes to the (wait, let me count) four (right, four? if Larabee's hurt, and Vin's at his side, and Nathan can't look at himself... seven minus three is... it's gotta be four!) four other men standing at the foot of the bed and said, "I jis' don' know. I ain't no doctor. But if the fever breaks and the wound don' turn poison and he don' lose anymore blood and don' nobody else shoot him or stab him or beat him or any combination of those things, then he should be all right."

The other four (dammit it's GOT to be four!) peacekeepers heaved huge sighs of relief and tromped out of the clinic and back to the saloon to eat, play cards, drink and probably get shot, stabbed or beaten (or some combination thereof) themselves. Except for Buck, who was going to hit on Inez again. And get shot down again.

Nathan left the bed to wash his hands, and Vin, still gripping Larabee's forearm, leaned over the bed and whispered to his hurting but no longer bleeding and barely conscious friend, "Ya jist rest now, cowboy. I got yer back."

Larabee smiled slightly and drifted into sleep, knowing he'd be all right. Until next time.

The end.