Imperfection

A Gunsmoke Story

by MAHC (Amanda)

"Imperfection is the greatness of man."

Ernst Fischer

1899-1972

Chapter Two: She is Worried, Yes?

POV: Matt

Spoilers: "Hidalgo"

Rating: PG

Disclaimer: I didn't create these characters. Shoot.

Matt Dillon slumped over the dark mane of his horse, eyes hooded and red, cheeks flushed, throat parched, desperately rationing what little strength he had left to staying in the saddle, counting on Buck to keep going, to stay the course.

The sun beat down on him; his hat, tugged low over his eyes, protected him as best it could from the harsh rays. Around him, the sparse desert scrubs had given way to thicker patches of grassland. Not that it mattered. He had long since lost the ability or interest to distinguish details. Days melted together with the heat. His world had narrowed to his horse and the earth below his hooves, because each step the big dun took brought him closer to the end, closer to home, closer to Dodge.

Closer to her.

XXXX

He was a good four days out of Chihuahua when he began to realize his mistake. Not the first one he had ever made, of course. In fact, he wouldn't have been in that particular predicament if it weren't for his previous mistake of underestimating Mando. But that had worked out, if not perfectly, then well enough. Or so he had thought when he left Agustin, Lucero, and young Lucho after allowing himself a week's recovery in their kind and generous care.

They had all urged him – particularly Lucero – to stay longer, to give his body more time to heal. They had, no doubt, saved his life, and he was definitely obliged to them, but Dodge City waited for his return – not very patiently, he bet. And a journey of more than a week lay before him and Buck. So he headed out, leaving them with two misshapen bullets and a U.S. marshal's badge to remember him by.

The weakness came upon him after he was well into Texas. At first he thought it might simply be the heat waving before his eyes and swirling inside his head. It had, after all, lasted only a few seconds before he managed to blink his sight back to normal. But that was followed by the return of the embers of a fire deep in his chest and side, the re-ignition of those wounds Agustin had tended so diligently. And with the burn came the dizziness, the thirst – the fever.

He calculated his chances of returning to their home and decided he had just as good a shot of making it to Dodge, so he plodded on, bracing his left hand against the flaring pain, rationing his store of water against the time his body couldn't function without it.

Five more days to Dodge if he didn't fall off the pace, if the weather cooperated, if highwaymen stayed away. Five days.

But the odds were not good.

Even ignoring his wounds and the abundant dangers of the trail, he had realized two days before that he was being tailed. One of Mando's men, perhaps, although he hadn't seen any of them who seemed to have enough mettle or energy to follow the U.S. marshal who had killed their leader. Matt still wasn't very clear on that moment, even though he must have been clear enough at the time. He remembered riding into Merced, Buck doing more of the leading than he was. He remembered somehow sliding off the saddle, but having to hang onto the horn simply to stay on his feet. He remembered taunting Mando, goading him into calling off his goons and facing Matt's challenge mano a mano. And he remembered seeing those hard black eyes flinch as he drew, then fade as the life left them.

And then he remembered nothing until he woke three days later, according to Agustin, back in the humble home of the old man and his grandchildren, Lucero's beautiful face, somehow softer and gentler, looking down at him as she ran a cool cloth over his brow.

XXXX

"So you have decided to return to us," the young woman said, smiling. Behind her, Lucho grinned in delight.

He blinked away the haze and tried to answer, tried to make his mouth work, but couldn't quite manage the task.

"Do not talk, Law," she instructed, but her tone remained kind. "You are still very weak. Lucho has been worried." Her eyes told him Lucho wasn't the only one.

She held a cup to his lips and he sipped at the water, enjoying its cool path down his throat. Thus fortified, he made a more successful attempt to speak.

"Thank you."

Broader smiles rewarded his effort. "I told you he would be all right!" the young boy called. "Marshal, you will be all right."

"I'll be – fine, Lucho," he breathed, grimacing as his right side throbbed with the movement.

"You will be," Agustin agreed, stepping into his sight from behind Lucero. "But not for a while, yet."

He couldn't argue with that as the darkness closed in on him once more, and their smiles disappeared from his sight.

When he woke again, Lucero still sat by him, wiping his forehead. "Good morning, Law," she greeted, pulling the cloth away. "How do you feel?"

In truth, his head pounded, his chest and stomach throbbed, and he swallowed to keep from being sick right there in front of her. "Fine."

She narrowed her eyes in doubt. "You still have a fever, but it's lower, I think. You were foolish to go after Mando when you were so sick still."

"Maybe." Of course, he could have done nothing else.

"Thank you, though."

He nodded.

"You have been a lawman for many years," she observed, peeling back the blanket and lifting a bandage from one of the wounds.

"Yeah."

"Your body tells of many injuries."

He cleared his throat and wondered just how many tales she had seen on his body. "A few."

Lucero smiled. "More than a few. Are you that good or that bad?"

A tight chuckle was his response.

She worked in silence for a few minutes, cleaning and re-bandaging, her gentle hands careful enough to cause only a few flinches from him. But when she pulled the blanket back over his chest, Matt was more than a little relieved to lower his guard.

"Who is Kitty?" she asked, voice casual but eyes sharp.

Okay, guard back up.

He glanced at her as she handed him a warm tortilla and waited with a cup of water. Swallowing, he gave her a crooked smile. "Why?"

But Lucero was certainly not naïve. "You called her name, called for her while you were sick."

Dropping his eyes uncomfortably, he started to shrug, but thought better of it when his ribs protested. "She's a woman I know back in Dodge."

"You know her well, I would say."

His cheeks flushed, and he hoped the fever covered the increase in color. But he didn't refute the observation. Instead, he nodded. "I do."

"She loves you."

He lifted his chin in question. "How do you know?"

She raised her brow, taking the rest of the tortilla from him and lifting the water cup so he could drink. "She has stayed with you a long time, no?" Lucero asked.

After he swallowed, he nodded to her. What did it matter if she knew? "She has."

"She is not your wife?"

"No."

"But there is no other?"

"No."

Lucero considered his responses for a moment, then said, "She must be some woman."

He didn't have to think about that. "She is."

"You love her?"

He didn't have to think about that, either, but considered reminding her that she had told him his personal question about Mando and her was none of his business. Instead, he pressed his lips together for a moment before finally looking her in the eye. "I do."

"It is good to love someone," Lucero observed, her dark eyes sad, and he resisted the urge to touch her face, not with any romantic intent, but to comfort – and perhaps to offer his thanks for all she had sacrificed for him.

She stood, breaking the moment. "So we must make you well to return to her. She is worried, yes?"

XXXX

She is worried, yes?

She is worried, yes.

Worried, yes.

Yes.

The words echoed in his skull and he pried open his eyes to break the sound. He squinted up into the sun, wincing at the memory that had nothing to do with any physical discomfort, but had everything to do with the guilt of knowing he had, once again, caused Kitty pain. A few weeks, he had told her as she lay in his arms that last night. A few weeks, but they both realized it could be much longer – or forever.

In a rare moment of lucidity, he pondered again why the hell he had thought Mando would just roll over when he came for him. Overconfidence, maybe? After all, there were outlaws who did just that. Pride, perhaps? No, not that. He had long ago lost the ego of invincibility of a cocky young marshal. No, this had simply been a mistake, an underestimate of the bandit.

It didn't matter anyway. What was done was done.

She is worried, yes?

Yes.

Surely he was almost there. Surely Dodge had to be near. How long had he ridden? He couldn't remember, didn't recognize the flatlands that passed by slowly. But they were flat at least, that meant something. Kansas, possibly, or close to it.

At least that what he told himself.

Buck stumbled slightly over a patch of rocks, not much, but enough to jar his rider. It was as if someone had slid a knife down his chest and into his gut. Instinctively, he pulled back on the reins to stop the horse, to give himself a moment – or more than a moment – to fight through the pain, but Buck ignored him as if he knew they could not afford to lose any time. Gritting his teeth against the nausea that pressed against his throat, he tried to force his breathing to slow, to regain control, but the world swirled in front of him and he felt his body falling forward, being sucked into a vortex of colors and sounds and strange sensations. Somewhere deep in his brain he chided himself for the weakness, but it wasn't enough to stop the inevitable slide into the depths.

"Hang on, Cowboy."

What?

"Hang on."

"Kitty?" he mumbled, grasping vainly for enough energy to lift his head, to open his eyes, to look at her.

"Don't do it."

Do what?

"Don't you do it, Matt Dillon. Don't leave me. Don't you dare leave me."

Desperately, he tried to reach out to her, to feel her arms around him, to see her face, her eyes, but it was harder now, heavier.

"Matt!"

Her cry cut its way through his fractured thoughts, solidified at the center of his brain and torn him loose from the whirlwind. Suddenly, he felt the hard leather of the saddle beneath his thighs, heard the clopping of Buck's hooves on the ground, tasted the bitterness of salt and blood and fatigue in his mouth. Suddenly, his eyes were open, and he was staring at a sea of grass with only a tree buoy or two breaking the monotony.

Kitty.

Not there.

But not far, though. Surely not far.

"Don't you dare leave me."

Kitty knew the risks as well as he did, knew the odds would catch up with him one day, knew he couldn't promise her he would return.

Not that any of that mattered a damn bit.

He had already disappointed her too much. He had to make it back to Dodge. She would never forgive him if he didn't.

With a shaking hand, he managed to pry the top off his canteen and pour the last of its contents down his throat, clutching at the brief revival of his senses. With a soft click, he urged Buck into a trot, holding onto his wounds as best he could, focused on the path ahead, focused on home, focused on Dodge.

Focused on her.

TBC