A DOCTOR IN THE FAMILY
By Linda Ellen
April 2011
This is just a shortie, written for the April 2011 forum challenge; I just never got around to putting it up. The story was written from two screen caps – one of Michaela tied up, looking forward with a worried expression (taken from the episode The Prisoner) and the other a shirtless Sully embracing Michaela from behind, both with somber expressions.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman (but those people aren't using them anyway!)
oo
Sully trotted his horse up to the ramshackle cabin and dismounted. Huffing a sigh, he removed several rabbits hanging from his saddle and crossed the porch. Looking around as he entered the one room structure, the hair on the back of his neck rose and his vivid blue eyes narrowed as he glanced at the three men inside, noticing they were shooting glances at each other.
"What's goin' on?" he asked guardedly.
"Oh, not much," Jed Stearate, answered nonchalantly. "Just discussin' what we're gonna do about a certain...problem." The others snickered at his remark.
Sully's eyes narrowed even more. "What problem?"
"The problem out in the barn," another answered, causing the third man to chuckle and smack his arm.
"Somebody wanna tell me what you're talkin' about?" Sully barked, exasperated at this latest development. He wasn't sure what was going on, but whatever it was, he had a feeling it wasn't 'good.'
"We got us a woman tied up out there," the first man responded.
"A woman?" Sully whispered. "What woman?" he added louder. "I thought the plan was to lay low for awhile..."
"We decided to go get us some money," Jed supplied challengingly, his distrust of the mountain man surfacing. "Robbed the Denver stage...stupid driver fought back..." he shrugged uncaringly.
"And..." Sully prompted.
"And this woman started yellin' orders at us...so we grabbed her as a hostage."
"I thought we agreed no killin'," Sully groused, one hand raking through his long wavy hair as the other unconsciously fingered his tomahawk.
"Well I didn't agree. And who died and made you boss, anyway?" he added loudly, quickly shoving a chair aside to stand nose to nose with Sully.
Before the mountain man could respond, Bart stood up and placed himself between them. "Alright, now, back off, both of ya."
"She's seen our faces...there ain't nothin' for it but to kill 'er," Ben interjected, turning toward a spittoon in the corner and letting a wad fly.
"True..." Jed agreed, his rugged face slowly transforming into lecherous grin. "But, I say we have a little...fun with her first."
With that statement, Sully instantly knew they weren't talking about a sweet little old bespectacled grandma.
"Hold on, if anybody's gonna have a little fun around here, it's me. You guys owe me, remember?"
The men grumbled and swore, knowing he was right, they had agreed to that after he had saved their hides from that rabid bear, and a criminal's word is their bond. Without another word, Sully turned on his heel and left the cabin, quickly crossing the distance to the barn. Slipping silently inside, he bolted the door behind him.
OOOO
Michaela Quinn strained at the ropes binding her hands for what must have been the hundredth time. Never in her entire life had she been so frightened. Huffing in frustration, she wished she had kept her mouth shut about the driver until the holdup men had made their getaway.
In the blink of an eye, nearly everything people had warned her about had come true.
"You could be scalped by Indians! Or taken hostage by some filthy, bearded hold up men!" her mother had eerily predicted as she tried in vain to stop Michaela from leaving Boston to live out west, chasing her 'fantasy' of being a doctor.
"Mother please, nothing like that is going to happen to me," she had condescendingly answered.
Now as she racked her brain to try and figure a way out of this seemingly hopeless predicament, she was starting to wonder if her mother had been right.
Just then, she heard a horse trot up and stop at the cabin. She swallowed nervously as the prospect of four holdup men instead of three compounded her fears.
Glancing quickly to the side, she stared at her doctor's bag. If only I could get it open...I could cut myself loose with my bandage scissors... Straining at the ropes and wiggling this way and that for several minutes, she finally managed to maneuver her bound feet to the side and tip the bag over just as she heard the cabin door open.
Hearing quick steps coming her way, she swallowed dryly around the gag in her mouth. Her heart immediately beginning to pound within her chest, her eyes glued to the door, then watched as the shadowed figure of a man stepped in, shutting the door behind him.
OOOO
Sully moved forward slowly, the dim light of the barn's cool, damp interior allowing him to see that the woman, wearing a light blue, low necked dress, her lovely hair long and wavy, was indeed young...and very beautiful...and she was staring at him in fierce trepidation.
Slowly approaching, his observant eyes taking in the open medical bag to her left, he immediately wondered what the heck a beautiful woman like her would be doing with that...
"Mmmm," Michaela moaned fearfully and nervously shook her head as he approached. Having made out that his hair was long and he was wearing buckskins and a blousy blue shirt with Indian beads and some sort of leather pouch around his neck, she immediately pegged him as a half-breed Indian. Her heart skipped a beat as her mother's voice replayed in her mind about the 'savage Indians in the West' and what they would do to an unprotected white woman.
Finally, the man reached her and stood gazing down. She held her breath, determined to fight to the bitter end to protect her virtue from this outlaw. As that thought went through her mind, however, she chanced a look up his body, past the view of his magnificently tanned and hairy chest afforded by the several open buttons of his shirt - to his face, and the most strikingly beautiful pair of blue eyes she'd ever seen. As their eyes met, time stopped...
Sully drew in a breath, caught unawares by the power the gorgeous woman's unusual two-toned eyes suddenly had over him, rendering him speechless. Moments passed...
Remembering time was of the essence he shook his head and blinked, crouching beside her to loosen the gag on her mouth. She cringed in reaction and leaned away, but Sully murmured gently, "Trust me...I ain't gonna hurt ya."
Something about the gentle tone of his voice soothed her somewhat, and after a moment she leaned her head forward a bit to allow him access to the knot at the back. Her mouth free, Michaela tried to moisten her dry lips, whispering, "Who are you?"
"Name's Sully. I'm workin' under cover with Marshal Elias Birch," he explained as he worked to untie the ropes on her hands. "We came up with a plan to catch the Stearett gang...that's the men who robbed the stage you were on and took you."
"What kind of a plan?" Michaela asked as she rubbed her aching wrists and shoulders.
"You alright?" Sully asked gently, noticing her movements. She nodded gratefully.
"Well...I pretended to be on the run from the law and joined up with 'em. Been leavin' markers so the marshal could follow us easy," he explained, moving quickly to untie her ankles. "Then yesterday I left 'em, said I was goin' huntin', but I really went to meet Marshal Birch. They said they were just gonna hol' up here, but they got restless," he added, indicating her robbery and capture. "Now I gotta figure a way to get you outta here," he added, casting a glance around the musty old barn.
Looking back at her, he asked, "Um...what's your name, anyway?"
She smiled and stuck her hand out for him to shake. "Michaela Quinn, MD," she added proudly.
"So you really are a doc, then?" he asked in awe. "You went to college...and everythin'?"
"Yes...and everything," she grinned in reply, that question having been asked of her more times than she could count. "I'm on my way to Colorado Springs to take the position of town doctor...I'm answering an advertisement they placed in the Boston Globe," she added shyly, accepting his hand to help her stand up.
Sully smiled softly, his eyes twinkling. "That's good...town sure needs one," he answered in a murmur, before chiding himself for forgetting the task at hand. "Uh, we gotta get you outta here."
Thinking quickly, he glanced in the direction of the cabin, then back to Michaela. "Can you ride?"
She nodded in response.
"Ok...c'mon," he murmured, turning toward the barn's back door. Opening it carefully, he motioned for her to wait, eased to the edge and peeked around. Very grateful that he never had to tie his horse, he tilted his head back and whistled a soft mourning dove call, watching with satisfaction as the animal turned its head toward its master. Sully whistled again and the horse ambled slowly toward him. When he was within reach, Sully grasped the reins in one hand, Michaela's hand in the other, and they snuck away on foot, making sure to keep the barn between them and the view from the cabin.
When they reached the edge of the woods, Sully hoisted Michaela up onto the saddle and vaulted up behind her, kicking the horse into a fast trot through the trees. They rode hard, trying to get to safety, but all too soon heard the unmistakable sound of horses galloping behind them. Sully kicked the horse faster, Michaela clinging to the saddle's horn.
Suddenly, a shot rang out and Michaela screamed as Sully was flung from the horse's back, landing hard on his side on the rocky ground.
OOOO
"Sully!" Michaela screamed, bolting up in bed as tears filled her eyes.
Instantly he was there, wrapping his arms around her from behind as she panted breathlessly, striving to come fully out of her nightmare.
"Ssshh, I'm here, it's okay," he murmured against her hair.
She shuddered and drew in a deep breath as her hands clutched his arms, wrapped firmly across her upper chest.
"Oh Sully...I was dreaming...we were trying to escape...you were shot..." Michaela gasped, turning in his arms to run her fingers through his hair and gaze into his eyes to reassure herself that he was, indeed, unharmed.
Calming down quickly in the warmth of her husband's embrace, she began to relax and allowed him to resettle her back down in the bed.
"Shot, huh?" he murmured, snuggling her against his side.
"Yes...it was horrible...and so real..." she whispered, leaning back to gaze at his face as she strived to erase the terrible images from her mind.
Grinning, he wiggled his eyebrows, quipping, "Glad there's a doctor in the family."