Nathan Saves the Day
Setcheti's answer to Twyla Jane's December Challenge: I throw down the gauntlet and I ask you brave fic writers to step forth and accept my challenge unto thee….
"A seed of doubt once planted, sown deep had begun to grow and crack the very foundation that united them." Incorporate this into your story whether it be text or theme. Any AU. Can be anything from drama to dare I say humor. Oh did I say that Nathan has to be one of the main players and mind you not just as a healer…? I did now. Now get to it Ladies….
Oh yes I know I am evil but I could have asked you to include a barrel of oil, dynamite and some pissed off reptiles … (oh my where did that come from????)

Nathan had been putting in his weekly earnings when someone behind him said loudly. "Mr. Watson, how long am I gonna have to wait around here while this damn darkie counts out his pennies one at a time?"

Nathan just rolled his eyes and shook his head and the banker sighed long-sufferingly. "Mr. Nelson, I'll be with you in just a moment - until then you can wait your turn just like everyone else does." He returned his attention to the healer, who was entering the deposit neatly in his little bank book. "Looks like business has been good, Mr. Jackson."

"Unfortunately," was the healer's wry reply. "Hopefully folks'll be a little less accident-prone next week, once they've gotten used to bein' careful walkin' around on all this ice and snow again."

"Know what you mean - I almost slipped myself the other morning," Watson replied. "And speaking of accidents, how is Mr. Standish faring? I haven't seen him about yet this morning."

The black man grinned and shook his head. The gambler had been injured two weeks previous while using dynamite to clear a blockage composed of oil drums and other railroad debris from the middle of the nearby river. The cold snap had not yet hit, and while attempting to take cover the hapless man had encountered and been chased back into the open by several angry snakes who apparently felt they had more right to the hiding place than he did. A piece of the at that point airborne debris had subsequently impacted Ezra's left leg, resulting in a bruise so severe that he was still walking with the aid of a cane - an accessory that had turned into entertainment once the bored man saw how much it extended his reach. "I'm sure he'll be by - you have icicles hangin' over the stoop, he won't be able to resist for long."

"I'll refrain from knocking them down myself, then," the banker chuckled. "Far be it from me to deny him the pleasure. Will there be anything else, Mr. Jackson?"

"Nope - just you be careful on that ice though, I've made enough of a livin' this week." Nathan smiled at the still-chuckling banker and nodded politely to Nelson before making his way out of the bank.

Ethan Nelson was not amused. Ever'body acts like that damn darkie's just as good as one of us, he thought to himself as he grudgingly pushed his monthly mortgage payment across the counter for the banker to count. Got above himself, that's what he's done. He finished with his transaction, glowering through Mr. Watson's admonishment not to be late the next month, and stepped out into the cold air. And he ain't the only one, he thought darkly, seeing the town's resident gambler sauntering down the boardwalk on the other side of the street, surreptitiously using the cane he was leaning on to break up the slick patches of ice on the worn walkway as he went. Goddamn conman, look at him over there tippin' his hat to them ladies just like he was some kind of fine upstanding citizen - any decent town would have done run him out or strung him up a long time ago. That's what comes of handin' the town over to some kid that thinks he's a sheriff, I guess; gunslinger's and lowlifes roamin' the streets bold as ya please and the honest folk end up steppin' aside for 'em time and again. Wonder when that judge will get us some real law and not this here rabble we got now?. He contemplated stopping at the saloon and got angry all over again when the too-light feel of his pocket reminded him that that luxury was denied to him at the moment. The other pocket, on the other hand…no way for his wife to know how much egg money there'd been, she could just take what he gave her and be glad about it. An unpleasant smile on his face, Ethan jingled the sparse coins in his hand and made a beeline for the saloon.

Ethan Nelson's wife was later informed that the eggs had been broken on the way to town; several of her husband's friends had also been dodging their familial responsibilities in the saloon that day and the talk had flowed as freely as the whiskey - at least, until their combined funds ran out and Inez refused to let them run a tab. The bar manager had not, in fact, been too pleased with the main topic of the conversation as fueled by her cheapest whiskey and was not inclined to be generous to the men who had spent several hours loudly discussing the need to replace the 'bad element' in town with some 'real law'. Not that Inez had taken the complaints seriously, she was just annoyed by them.

But the saloon had been busy that day and the seven peacekeepers occupied elsewhere, and gossip spreads fast in a small town steeped in frozen boredom by the advent of a hard winter; the fact that the men who had started the whole thing weren't exactly the town's best element themselves was quickly forgotten. Within four days there was talk of calling a town meeting to discuss the 'lawkeeping situation in Four Corners' and how it might be 'altered for the town's betterment'. The town's seven peacekeepers suddenly and inexplicably found their every action under scrutiny and their every decision questioned, and several of them started to put forth the idea that if the town didn't want them then maybe it was time to move on and let Four Corners fend for itself. Vin, Buck and Chris had been avid proponents of that plan while Nathan, JD and, surprisingly enough, Ezra, had retreated into concerned silence at the suggestion. Josiah as usual had abstained from voicing any opinion at all, but Nathan had noticed a distinctly troubled expression on the large ex-preacher's face each time the man looked at the obviously unhappy Southerner; of all of them, it was Ezra who had the most to lose if the town kicked them out. The other men seemed to have forgotten that fact, and when Buck had needled the gambler one too many times about moving to greener pastures Ezra had removed himself from their presence with an alacrity that startled everyone.

Returning to the clinic later, the healer had been surprised to hear a creaking noise coming from inside. Feeling for his weapon, he cautiously entered the main room and tried to locate the source of the sound; it seemed to be coming from…the balcony? It was freezing outside, what would someone be doing on the balcony? He made his way over to the door and looked out.

Creak, creak, creak. Ezra was sitting in the rocking chair on Nathan's balcony, his cane propped against the railing, staring out over the town. "Ezra?" Nathan asked quietly. "Everything okay?"

Creak, creak, creak. "My leg hurts," the gambler said softly without turning around or ceasing the slow motion of the chair. Nathan stood and watched him for a moment and then went back inside the clinic. This was bad, this was very bad. He was going to have to come up with some sort of plan to fix things and fast.

Two more days went by and Nathan still hadn't thought of anything. A date for the town meeting was set and several people sent telegrams to Judge Travis requesting his presence there to assure the legality of the proceedings. Buck and Chris abandoned the comfort of the saloon for the privacy of the jail and JD stopped making his regular walks through the town, instead spending most of his time holed up in the church with Josiah. Vin vanished from sight; Nathan knew the tracker was still in town, but he wouldn't have wanted to try and prove it. And Ezra would have slept in the creaking chair on the balcony if the healer would have allowed him to. The odd family of brothers that had protected Four Corners for two years was disintegrating before Nathan's eyes…and no one but him seemed inclined to do anything about it.

And then Ethan Nelson's wife Amy made an appearance in the clinic; her youngest son had developed a worrisome cough. Nathan gently examined the small boy and prescribed a soothing syrup to ease the irritation, advising his mother that it was nothing serious as long as the child stayed warm and out of the weather until the cough was gone. While he was mixing up a sufficient quantity of syrup, the woman asked him if the disbanding of the Seven would mean he would be leaving town as well. "I don't want to leave y'all without a healer," he answered honestly. "But I have to admit, it pretty much makes me sick inside that this town can turn on all of us like this just because of - beggin' your pardon, Miz Nelson - but just because of some angry drunken men shootin' off their mouths in the saloon of an afternoon. It just ain't right."

She looked confused. "I would have to agree, but why would you be begging my…" The light came on, and confusion became tight-lipped anger. "Oh that…Ethan; broken eggs indeed!" She paid Nathan for the syrup and took her wide-eyed child in hand. "Thank you kindly, Mr. Jackson; and I believe after today you shall have one less loud-mouthed drunkard to worry about. Come, Micah, we are going home to have a talk with your father!"

And a plan was born. Nathan was ideally placed to carry it out, and one by one he carefully targeted the other five wives with no one suspecting a thing. And those seeds of doubt, once planted and sown deep among the families of the original six dissidents, began to grow and crack the very foundation that had united the town against its seven lawmen. The healer didn't stop there; putting Josiah's penchant for long-winded reminiscing to good use for a change, he kept those cracks from closing by stuffing them full of the town's recent history as starring 'The Magnificent Seven'. JD quickly fell into line with the endeavor as well, resuming his regular patrols of the streets and openly engaging the people who'd been watching him the hardest in 'innocent' conversation. After seeing the young sheriff in action a few times, Nathan began to have a sneaking suspicion that Ezra wasn't the only con artist in town - and possibly not the best one, either.

The mood of the town began to change. Ezra descended from his frigid perch on the clinic's balcony and went back to breaking up ice with his cane as he exercised his still-healing leg along the boardwalk. Chris and Buck left the seclusion of the jail and returned to their regular spot in the saloon, preventing trouble just by their threatening presence. And Vin…well, Vin stopped being invisible and was actually being seen here and there about the town again. It soon came to Nathan's ears - as almost everything did eventually through his patients in the clinic - that the town meeting was likely to be cancelled due to lack of interest and the judge had been notified that his presence was not needed after all.

Nathan had saved the day.

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