Cowboys Like Us

by Kemmae

Disclaimer: I don't own the guys, I don't own the song, but I like them both and thought they should go together. Hope you enjoy!

Chris Larabee waited in the yard with his team, each making that last check on gasoline gauges, making that last tug to leather gloves and tightening straps. Each one, that is, except Vin.

"Where is he?" JD asked, ever impatient.

"Give him a minute, kid. You know he's still moving slow," Buck said, smoothing his mustache and adjusting his rearview mirror.

Chris ran fingers through his hair, thinking back to weeks before and that horrible phone call...

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Friday night of a long week, and Chris settled in to watch a movie in his worn leather armchair. Buck, JD, and Nathan all had dates lined up, Ezra was out of town visiting his mother, and Josiah attended a conference in Washington, D.C. Vin would've been at the ranch, stretched out on the couch, except that Team 5 had "borrowed" him for an undercover assignment. And so Chris sat alone.

Pounding on the living room door woke him. Buck stood on the other side, dripping wet and with a look in his eye that said he hadn't just been in the neighborhood.

Everything blurred in his mind, but somehow Buck got through to him that Vin had been made the day before everything came down but no one realized it until the warehouse was searched after the bust.

The walk into Vin's hospital room drew everything back into sharp focus. Beeps and whirrs and swishes of air from the machines that circled him echoed in Chris's head. Blinding white sheets reflected Vin's skin tone and contrasted with the bruises that peeked from bandages surrounding his face, his arms, his casted leg.

Weeks melted together as one mass of time spent at his friend's side. The others had come and gone, and he thought they managed to see that he ate now and then. Or maybe it had only been the weak coffee that left a bitter taste in his mouth that kept him alive. All he knew was that he couldn't think of anything beyond Vin regaining consciousness, getting well, making it through.

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A few minutes more passed. "Would you prefer I go and see if he's feeling quite well enough for this little excursion?" Ezra asked.

Chris let his gaze slide over. If he'd only listened when Ezra asked to go in as Vin's backup in the first place they maybe wouldn't have gone through those long weeks of waiting and wondering. Maybe he should take the undercover agent's suggestions to heart more often. But then again...

"Give him a few more minutes."

JD fairly danced among them, anxious to set off on the trip they'd planned for so long now. Josiah slid his sunglasses on, shifting the motorcycle under him, trying to get the feel for it. Buck put in a stick of Dentine and offered Nathan one. And they waited.

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"We ain't all done nothin' together in awhile."

Chris was surprised. "We hang out together all the time. You just think that because you've been in here so long."

"Nah, I mean not just hangin' at the Saloon or at yer place." Vin shifted his leg slightly, trying to push himself up more on the bed. Chris watched him tense as the pain shot through, saw the stiff arm move over the bound ribs as his breath cut off. "An' not that 'team-building' crap Travis sets us up fer. Mean goin' an' doin' something just us guys fer no reason but to stir up a little trouble."

"You don't think you've found enough trouble to hold you for a while?"

He stiffened as a laugh tried to push its way through. "This's work trouble. Not the fun kind."

Chris stared at his friend and smiled, thinking of the long weeks of recuperation and therapy his friend had to face. Thinking of keeping an injured Tanner in place once his mind told him he was feeling better, whether his body believed it or not. "What'd you have in mind? You behave yourself these next few weeks and listen to the doctors around here for a change, and we just might see what we can do."

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"Feels good to have my old bike out and running again," Buck commented.

Chris nodded. He and the others had rented theirs for this trip. Vin insisted it wouldn't be the same in a car or van. Said he'd made the trip along the quiet highways lined by dust and red rock all the way to Mexico several times on his own and always wanted to see it on the back of his cycle, and to have the guys with him. And he'd fought hard through the therapy and behaved himself with the doctors and nurses to make it happen.

Chris often had the feeling that, tough and determined as Tanner was, only the thought of this promised trip had gotten him through some of those toughest painful days. But he'd made it. They'd made it.

He focused again on the door. "Maybe we ought to go in and check—"

But just then the screen door swung open with a creak and slapped shut as Vin slowly crossed the porch and paused before easing down the steps.

Still pale from his time out of the sun, still stiff from his injuries, still sporting the yellowed remains of his bruises, still suffering the occasional left-over headache – but there in one piece, ready to ride, happy to start this adventure together.

"Chris, do ya think mebbe--?" Nathan asked.

"Nah, he'll be okay, Nate. We'll watch him."

That dopey Tanner grin spread across his face when Vin swung his leather-chapped leg over his Harley. His blue eyes shone brighter than they had in a long while, like a kid celebrating his second Christmas. Even his hair fell in those loose waves Mary always drooled over, and if Buck's theory on women and the "bad-boy" image held any water, Vin wouldn't be safe if the women at the office saw him like this.

"Finally!" JD said, almost trembling with excitement.

The others mounted their bikes and Nathan made one last check of the map in his pack. Vin rocked his cycle and kicked up the stand with well-disguised difficulty before letting his gaze rest on each of his team as they waited in a loose circle, ready to follow his lead.

"Thought you'd backed out, Tanner," Chris said, teasing.

"Not a chance." He watched his friend gaze at the sunrise, facing the wind. "Listen, y'all. Thanks fer all ya done fer me, bein' around n' all. Fer all ya done, an' all y'all keep on doin'. Appreciate it."

"Whoo-oo!" Buck howled. "All this and a Tanner speech, too! Now we gonna cut out of here sometime today, Junior, or what?"

Vin shot him a look and a smile. "Y'all just worry 'bout keepin' up, Bucklin."

He fired up and swung his bike out of the drive and down the lane with a choreographed wobble.

"You all heard him," Chris said, with a smile of his own. "Let's roll."

-- "Cowboys Like Us"/George Strait

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