A/N This is another old one, previously posted on Behind the Wagon.

Eleven Days

Day One

Time seemed to have stopped. All Little Joe knew was that something terrible had happened, and he had to find his Pa. He heard people groaning, and tried to muster up his courage. The seven year old stood and looked around. The train car lay on its side in the grass and weeds, and he was outside it, several feet from the doorway. Shakily, he walked toward the door of the car. A pile of luggage blocked his way. As he tried to raise his foot to climb over the luggage, a bloody hand reached out and grabbed his leg. He screamed and jerked himself free, running back to where he started.

Joe looked at the fallen car again. Unwilling tears fell from his eyes as he considered what to do next. He couldn=t get back in to find Pa and Hoss. The only way to save them was to go for help. Joe brushed the tears away with his hand and looked at the landscape around him. He saw large rolling hills in every direction. Just to the south, near the top of a peak, he saw smoke. He took one deep breath and ran for the smoke.

Hoss felt a searing pain in his side, and gasped. Then he felt another, and realized someone=s hands were the cause of it. He tried to push the hands away, but found his right arm was hurting, too. Hoss opened his eyes.

Two strangers hovered over him, a gray haired lady and a dark haired man. The lady noticed his eyes were open. "Stop, it hurts!" Hoss whined.

She took hold of his left hand and her voice was calm and soothing. "The doctor's just having a look at you. It won't take but a minute, young man." He grimaced at another prod, and she smoothed his hair back. "What's your name?"

"Hoss Cartwright." At the sound of his name, Hoss remembered his Pa and Little Joe. "Where's my Pa? And my little brother?" He almost sat up, but they held him down.

"You hold still, young man. You've got two broken ribs, and moving around like that is just going to make things worse."

The lady smiled at him. "Tell me your Pa and brothers' names and I'll see if I can't find them for you."

"Pa's Ben Cartwright, and my little brother is Joseph. He's only seven."

"All right, all right. Now you just relax and get some rest, and when I come back I'll be able to tell you about your family."

Hoss closed his eyes a moment, then jerked them open again. "Ma'am? What's your name?"

She smiled again. "I'm Evelyn Owens. Now you get some rest."

"Thank you, Mrs. Owens," he mumbled before he drifted off. Evelyn and the doctor conferred outside his door, just out of earshot.

"The arm needs to be set and the ribs wrapped up. He should be fine."

"Doctor, what about his father, Ben Cartwright?"

"That's his father? I just saw him an hour ago." The doctor paused and frowned. "I can't say, Evelyn. I just can't say."

"Have you heard of a seven year old boy named Joseph?"

"No, but that doesn't mean he's not here somewhere. There were so many passengers on that train..."

"You go ahead and make your rounds, doctor. I'll make inquiry about his brother."

"After you set the arm and wrap him up."

"Yes, Doctor."

Night was coming on, and in the thick woods, Joe was tripping on everything. The hill was getting steeper, and he could find nothing that looked even the slightest bit like a trail. He just kept running forward, picking himself back up when he fell. The smoke was a long way up, and if he just kept going, he would reach it eventually.

His stomach was growling, and he would have given anything for a drink, but he hadn't seen any streams nearby, and he didn't recognize any of these plants. There were mushrooms on the ground, but Adam had warned him once that you had to be careful of mushrooms, because some of them were poisonous.

Little Joe clambered up the hill until he couldn't see his hand in front of him. Tearfully, he realized he had to stop. He laid down near the trunk of a tree and scraped leaves up over himself for warmth.

Ben Cartwright laid on his back, arms stretched out at his sides, asleep. Hoss saw the bruise marks on his face and arms, and knew that Mrs. Owens had said he was hurt very badly. Hoss had been staring at him for an hour, now, and he hadn't even moved. The doctor said he'd fractured his skull, and he wore a bandage that covered his entire hairline. They were afraid he'd also broken his neck, but there was no way to know that for sure until he woke up.

Hoss wanted to cry again, but the tears wouldn't come. Mrs. Owens hadn't been able to find Little Joe, and the Sheriff said he'd go back to the crash site at first light and look again. Apparently, four of the train cars had derailed, and three of them had been passenger cars. They'd been bringing in casualties and corpses for hours. The Sheriff assured Hoss that Little Joe hadn't been inside any of the derailed cars. Probably, he'd been thrown from one, and they would pick him up easily at dawn.

The Sheriff had meant to be comforting, but Hoss found little comfort in his words. All he could think of was Little Joe shivering in the dark.