Bart slept for hours, not waking until he accidentally moved and sent pain rippling through his arm. He gasped and woke himself up, finding that he was alone in the room. It was a couple of minutes before he could breathe normally again after the flare of pain, and he tried to sit himself up a little, succeeding after what seemed like an eternity. It wore him out, and he knew that getting up and walking around earlier was one of the reasons. Closing his eyes, he laid there breathing heavily, and when he reopened them, he found Doc standing near the bed. The sight startled him; he hadn't heard him come in.

"How long have you been awake?" Doc asked.

Bart sighed carefully. "Five or six minutes."

"How many of those minutes were spent trying to sit up?" Doc asked next.

Bart smiled slightly at the question. "Most of them."

Doc echoed the sigh. "Thought so. You should've waited for me to get back."

Bart closed his eyes. "Didn't know when that would be."

Doc nodded. "You have a point there." He was holding a tray and he set it on the nightstand, taking his own plate off before placing the tray on Bart's lap. "Eat."

Bart wasn't very hungry, but he obeyed.

"I tried to find whoever owns the doubloon," Doc said, as he chewed. "I had no luck either."

"What if you find him and he's not the thief?" said Bart, stabbing a piece of chicken with his fork.

Doc had thought of that himself; just because the doubloon was in the alley didn't mean that it definitely belonged to the man who had robbed him. "In that case…I will not be happy."

Bart didn't blame him one bit; he'd be missing fifty-five hundred dollars with no hope of getting it back. "Do you have anymore ideas?"

Doc shook his head. "It looks like rain," he said. "Can't hunt in the rain."

As if on cue, thunder rolled in the distance.

"There's gotta be something we can do," said Bart.

Doc shook his head. "There's nothing, Bart. I think my money is long gone. While that crate was over my head, those beautiful dollar bills were waving goodbye to me from that stranger's pocket."

Bart sighed as he finished eating. "So you plan to give up?"

Doc shrugged. "It's hard to do, but hard not to do, when I know that it must be gone by now."

Thunder rolled again, louder this time.

"I have an idea," Bart said.

Doc looked at him.

"I'll play poker, and after I win enough, I'll go outside and pass that alley," Bart said. "Maybe the thief will do the same thing to me, and you'll be right there to grab him."

Doc just stared at him. "You'll risk violence to yourself while already wounded?"

Bart shrugged with the shoulder on his good arm. "We have to get your money back."

Doc didn't know what to say. Bart would do that for him after what he'd done?

Bart could easily tell what Doc was thinking. "Friends help each other, Doc."

It was another few seconds before Doc could speak. "But can it really be that easy?"

Bart nodded. "Criminals are stupid. And if it doesn't work, what harm will it do to try? I'll have made some money and not had a crate dropped over my head."

Doc laughed.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The next day was a little less painful for Bart. He stayed in bed all day and slept as much as he could in preparation for the night's plans, and as the sun was setting, he and Doc made their way over to the saloon. A quick scan of the room showed that the stranger wasn't there, but that didn't mean that he wouldn't eventually show up and notice who was winning. Bart and Doc chose different tables, and each began to play.

Luck was on Bart's side, as he hoped that it would be, and he was winning from the very first hand. He quickly found that his opponents weren't very skilled, and his pile of money steadily increased. Doc was doing well too, and kept looking to see if the stranger ever entered the saloon. From what he could tell, the man never did.

Time passed sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. It didn't take long before Bart grew tired despite the rest he'd gotten that day, as his wounded body had not yet regained its full strength. The pain in his arm and side was getting harder to ignore, and Bart was glad that it was his left arm that had taken the bullet, as he merely had to hold the cards in the hand that stuck out of the sling.

With a smile, Bart laid down three jacks and two tens, which turned out to be his last hand of the night. He raked in the pile and counted it one-handed, coming up with forty-seven hundred dollars.

"How can one man be so lucky?" one of the players loudly asked. "You must be cheatin'! You have cards hidden in that sling!" He pulled out his gun.

Doc, sitting at the table behind the man, had his own gun in hand and shoved into the man's back before the player could blink. "Put it away," he said, jabbing the man in the back. "Now."

The man turned to see who it was, and when he realized that the feared Doc Holliday was the person defending Bart, he quickly obeyed.

"Smart boy," said Doc. He motioned for Bart to leave the saloon.

Bart obeyed, standing with a wince that he tried to hide and shoving the money into his pocket. He walked over to the door and outside, and a few seconds later, Doc joined him.

"Thanks, Doc," Bart said with relief, before shoving something into his friend's hands and walking off—towards the alley.

Doc looked down to find that Bart had given him his poker winnings to hold onto so that the thief couldn't get it. Good thinking, Bart, he thought. He followed ten feet behind him, half-hoping that the thief would strike, and half-hoping that he wouldn't, for the wounded Bart's sake.

Bart was thinking of Doc's money more than his own safety, and when something suddenly fell over his head, he gasped, despite knowing that it was coming. It was indeed an open crate, the inside bottom landing on his head—the impact making him see a flash—and the sides going halfway down his arms, painfully scraping the bullet wound on the outside of his arm, and squishing his arm against his body, making the inside wound bump into the one in his side. He found himself sitting on the ground while hands roughly grabbed his jacket.

A second later, the hands were gone.

Bart painfully pushed the crate off himself, in time to see Doc punch the man in the face and send him flying. Doc took out his gun and held it on him, but the man didn't move; he was out cold. Doc then looked at Bart and ran the few steps over before kneeling. "You all right?"

Bart looked at him and sighed, his good hand gripping his wounded arm. "You forgot to tell me something, Doc."

Doc frowned. "What's that?"

"That it would hurt," Bart said, with a wince.

"You're the one who wanted to help," Doc said.

Bart rubbed the top of his head. "Don't remind me."

Doc couldn't help but chuckle, as he reached for his friend's good arm and pulled him up, before they made their way back to the unconscious man.

Bart looked down at him. "That's the stranger?"

Doc nodded. "Yep." He held out his hand to Bart. "Thanks."

Bart smiled and shook it. "You're welcome." He yawned. "Can I go back to bed now?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The stranger turned out to be a stranger indeed: a man passing through town and robbing people along the way. Doc's money was found in the thief's hotel room—minus only one hundred dollars. He was overjoyed at that, and celebrated with the hotel's most expensive bottle of whiskey, bringing it to Bart's hotel room the next day, where he sat in a chair while a tired Bart stayed in bed.

"You really didn't have to help me after I shot you, Bart, accident or not," Doc said. "Honestly…I've..." He shrugged almost shyly. "I've never had a friend like you.

Bart smiled. "Glad to help, Doc."

"You're probably the only person I know who would've," Doc said, downing a glass of whiskey.

Bart inwardly agreed. Most people were afraid of Doc Holliday, and plenty had good reason, but very few people knew him the way Bart did: as a loyal friend.

"So where we goin' next?" Doc suddenly asked.

Bart frowned. "Next?"

Doc nodded. "Next. I got my money back, you won nearly just as much last night...we either gotta go spend it, or use it to make even more." He went to pour more whiskey into his glass, but found that the bottle was empty.

Bart looked down at his left arm, which was still in the sling. "Can I have more time to recover first?"

Doc nodded as he stood. "Sure, Bart, just don't take too long." He opened the door just as a bellboy walked by. "Right on time! My whiskey ran out, bring me another bottle, boy!"

The boy shot him a terrified look and ran down the hall.

Doc closed the door, looked at Bart, and rubbed his hands together. "So what trouble can we get into next? Any ideas?"

There was only one way for Bart to reply to that; he groaned and pulled the covers over his head. Lesson 5: Make safer friends…

THE END