Title: Wake
Author: JoJo (solosundance )
Fandom: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Characters: Nathan, Vin, Ezra
Rating: G
Wordcount: 808

Summary: Amidst grief, death, and destruction, Vin and Ezra keep the faith

A/n: A coda, of sorts, to episode 2.04 Vendetta


Save the desultory slap of a broom on the boardwalk, there was none of the usual end-of-day activity.   Town was in no hurry to get back to normal.  It had taken refuge, gone to ground.

From the bottom of the Livery steps Nathan could see faint points of light at shuttered windows. Most buildings remained closed although the church was open.  The street was deserted of traffic, save for the armored wagon, brooding in silent memoriam.
 
A smell of smoking metal and wood caught in the back of Nathan's throat.
 
Still, he wasn't one bit surprised to find Vin and Ezra in the unlit saloon.

Vin seemed to be keeping a watch.  He'd posted himself at very same window Nathan had smashed with the butt of his handgun earlier.
 
Ezra, hard to see in the shadows behind the bar, was clearing broken bottles in mechanical silence. All the lamps were in pieces.

Neither reacted when Nathan came through the batwings, which made him suspicious. He hadn’t had a chance to look either of them over until now.
 
All Nathan knew was Vin and Ezra’d carried four bodies off the street, Hank Connolly first.  After Larabee went and staged one of his damned disappearing acts, they’d been the ones to escort the living Nicholls brothers to the jailhouse, and Ma Nicholls to her half-crazed, half-penitent, vigil over the dead ones.  According to JD the two of them then shouldered three brand-new coffins from the undertaker to the church.  In between times they’d unhitched the wagon team, rounded up Buck and Josiah for stitching and bandaging, saw to it that JD and his busted ribs didn’t do anything they shouldn’t, and evidently began to put the saloon to rights.

Most of the tables had been set on their feet by the time Nathan got there, the glass and debris swept into a pile he thought needed to be cleared away before some fool fell in it and severed an artery.  He couldn’t help but sweep his eyes over the bullet-riddled walls, the comprehensively destroyed bar and furniture.  Each scorching mark intended to end lives.

Firefights left Nathan dizzy with a mix of relief and despair.  It always seemed inconceivable that the next one wouldn’t end with one half of them burying the other half.  Josiah, Buck, and Ezra, had all been lucky this time.

“Chris?” he asked, to distract himself, and get their attention.

There was a nervous clunk from the bar.  Vin rolled his shoulders, glanced over at Ezra before he answered.

“Not yet.  The boys?”
 
Vin sounded scratchy and he had blood all over his pants.  Nathan couldn’t help assessing the possibility of hidden injury and Vin caught the look, raising both hands from his lap as if to demonstrate his wholeness.

Dead men’s blood.
 
“They’ll live.” 

Nathan reached the bar and let his weight rest against it. 

There didn’t seem much point in explaining all about everything, but he did anyway.
 
Buck had dozed off in the easy chair up in Nathan’s clinic the moment the last stitch had been pulled.  Josiah, who ought to be taking the weight off his leg, was even now standing on the balcony outside the clinic, staring at his church as if it was being occupied by Satan himself.  They were supposed to be looking after each other and resting, of course, but likely the blamed fools would be limping over here before long like a pair of stubborn, shot-up, homing pigeons.

Ezra, the hint of a quirk at one eyebrow, slid a shot glass at him.  His shirtsleeve was singed brown at the cuff.

Nathan had a vision of the armored wagon going up in flames, of Ezra flying through the air, but when he opened his mouth to inquire about possible burns, Ezra said, “Shush, now.”

Vin’s boots made a slow, crunching sound across the boards.

“Josiah made me deal with Buck first,” Nathan said, to nobody in particular.

“Reckon he would do that.”  Vin bellied up next to him, nodded to Ezra for a shot.

“Couldn’t save the one from the wagon, or the gunshot brother, but I patched up the boy I knifed.”

“Reckon you did, Nathan.”

The fatigue kept at bay by hours of doctoring rolled over him. It felt good when Vin nudged him in the side. 

“Here,” Ezra said, richly Georgia. He set a box down on the bar-top.  Vin and him tipped their chins at one another. Nathan figured they had it all in hand.  Heavy-eyed, knowing he couldn’t stay too long, he sipped his whiskey, watched Vin and Ezra light candles, plenty of them, watched the saloon flicker into life.

Nathan was glad to see it, but didn't mean he wasn't itchy with the wrongness of it all.  Over at the church, he guessed, more candles burned.

Ma Nicholls, mother of all destruction. 

Likely she was keeping her faith, too.