A/N Yes, I did it; one more update before the third coming! I hope for a lot of awesome stuff I can use in this and (maybe) further FFs.

Btw; I've got Twitter now, too, so I can post news regarding my FF, dA and YT accounts. Link is on my profile, if somebody out there cares at all.

There will be one more Broken part before I head to the next part called Healing. I really stretch this more than I planned, sorry for that, but as I wrote I got more and more ideas and suddenly hit the 4k mark again.

Chapter 4
Broken II

New York City, New York
Manhattan
DEA New York Division
09:02 AM

Coffee, are Piper's first thoughts as she enters the building, grumbles a tired "morning" to other agents she walks by and steps into the elevator. She presses the same button as every morning and waits for it to lift her up to the third floor where her and Nicky's office is located. Every time she stands in this tiny room she thinks about why she uses it to get two floors up instead of taking the stairs. As always she promises herself to forego the comfort and use the stairs next time, full knowing that she won't do it anyway.

She removes her jacket and hangs it over the back of the chair. Nicky isn't there yet, but that's not uncommon. Her wild haired colleague is rarely punctual. Hell, it's a wonder that Piper is punctual today considering how she feels.

Waking up was like hell, she was greeted with a murderous headache which grew even more intense with every second the annoying beeping of the alarm clock continued. It took a while until Piper hit the right button to stop the sound only to have it instantly replaced by the snoring of Larry who, as usual, didn't wake up by the alarm. She watched him with envy, how he could just continue sleeping whereas she had to get going.

So she stood up, the world around her began to spin and turn, until she sat down again for a few seconds, rubbing her head, trying to ignore the pain and dizzy feeling. Somehow she made it to her bathroom, in the shower and put on some decent clothes for work where she is now.

She steps out of her office again and walks straight to the cafeteria to get her first coffee at work like every morning, but now she feels even more need for it.

Her eyes almost drop close as she leans against the counter and waits for the two cups to be filled.

"You look like crap, blanca", are the first words she hears as she receives the two cups of coffee.

"Good morning to you, too, Mendoza", Piper mutters, turns around and steps out of the cafeteria again while Mendoza gives orders to the other employees of the cafeteria in hasty Spanish.

Nicky must've came in while Piper was getting the coffee, she now sits on her chair, her feet propped up on her desk as always. As she sees Piper enter her tired gaze instantly fixes on one of the cups and her mouth forms a wide grin.

She stretches out her arm and makes gripping movements until Piper finally hands one of the cups over and leans herself against the desk next to Nicky's feet. Sighing she sips her coffee and tries to fight off one of her worst hangovers in months.

"Why so grumpy?", Nicky finally asks after studying Piper for some silent minutes.

"Long night", is all she mumbles with her lips glued to the cup and closed eyes while she ponders if she has some medicine hidden in her desk.

"Stop talking", Nicky raises her hand and grimaces, "I really don't need any more stories from straight girls about their hetero-relationships. I've got enough of those from Lorna."

"Oh, Larry had nothing to do with it", Piper counters without really thinking about it. But then she sees the face Nicky makes, damnit, she has one eyebrow raised, a big-ass smirk replaced her coffee-drinking smile and her eyes are questioningly and hopefully wide.

"Do I smell a fan-fucking-tastic story?"

"Nope, just coffee", Piper pushes herself away from Nicky's desk and walks over to her own. She puts the now empty cup on the bright wood and bents down to switch on her computer.

Nicky turns around to face Piper who slumps in her own chair, the head rests on the desk. "Come on, we've nothing to do anyway."

"Nothing to do? We've got a case."

"Yeah, but we can't do nothing without new clues."

"We usually get clues when we investigate, Nicky", she sighs, lifts her head and turns to the side. She opens several drawers until she finally finds a pack of aspirin. She pulls two tablets out and swallows them dry before remembering to check the date of expiry.

Which was four months ago.

Meh, whatever, she sighs again and throws the expired aspirin back in the drawer, closes it and lays her head back down on the wood hoping the medicine somehow still does what it's supposed to do.

"Shut up and spill."

"I've been to a bar. Then a club. And maybe drank a little bit too much", Piper eventually admits through gritted teeth, holding her thumb and index finger up to emphasize the word little and faces her colleague. It would be no use to try to keep quiet about yesterday's evening anyway. Nicky has a talent for being a pain in the ass until you say everything she wants to hear from you. A great feature as an investigator. But really annoying as a friend.

"You partied? Without me?", she asks with an exaggerated hurt voice, places one hand on her heart and opens her eyes and mouth wide in mock-shock.

"Next time when I'm mad and plan to leave the house close to an emotional breakdown I'll give ya a call."

"Trouble in paradise?"

"Something like that", Piper mumbles and a small unconscious smile creeps on her face at the memory of the fact that her conversation with Alex started in a similar way.

Again she gets lost in thought as she considers what to say to Larry later when they'll have their since long overdue talk. But now there's more to talk about than just their endless arguing.

As much as she tried not to think about her, Alex was on her mind all night long. Her smirk and those darkened eyes moments before she leaned in to kiss her were glued to her retina. She saw it when she lied in bed slowly falling asleep and it was still there when she woke up with her headache. It's a wonder she didn't dream of her, too. Or maybe she did and she just forgot? She'll never know.

Suddenly Piper acknowledges the hand which waggles in front of her face and the serious voice of her colleague. "Chapman? You home?"

Annoyed Piper slaps the hand away and gazes grimly at Nicky. "What?"

"I'm waiting for an answer for like five minutes now."

"Answer to what?"

"If you wanna grab a drink after work", Nicky sighs and leans back in her chair with which she rolled over to Piper.

"Do I look like I'd be up for drinks today?"

"Come on, I'm a good listener. Believe it or not."

"You just love other's dramas."

"True", Nicky laughs but her eyes are still sincere, she really seems to want to help Piper in some way.

"Today's bad", she shakes her head, she can't delay the talk with her fiancé again, something has to happen in their relationship, "gladly tomorrow though."

New York City, New York
Manhattan
01:17 PM

One glance at the numbers flashing in bright red on the clock standing on her nightstand tells her one of the big advantages of not having to do any work for a while.

Sleep late. Really late.

No mobile rings in the middle of the night or early mornings, people calling and expecting answers, giving information or orders, scheming new arrangements. No e-mails expected to be answered all day long. No coffers need to be packed.

Instead Alex can use her time to lie in bed, to sleep, to think about other things than drugs. And in this moment a certain blonde fills her thoughts.

Her gaze wonders across the room to the open door which leads into the living room of her New Yorker apartment. Her vision is blurry, her glasses still on her nightstand, but she knows exactly that over one of the chairs in the next room a jacket is spread. A jacket with the smell of a stranger and alcohol.

A small smile settles on her face. She can't explain why. She isn't the type of person who feels anything about anybody besides her family which only consists of her mother who died years ago. Especially she doesn't feel anything about somebody she met not even twenty-four hours ago. But this woman participates of something Alex feels drawn to.

It took a few moments until she came to terms with Piper just storming out of the club, not even coming back to get her jacket. And it took her even longer to concentrate back on the one task she gave herself to do; recruit possible mules. She wasn't very successful though and had to go home empty handed, not literally since she took Piper's jacket with her, and a liver running at full speed.

She shakes the memories of and gets out of her bed, puts her glasses on so that the world around her starts to get clear again.

Stretching and yawning she walks over to her kitchen, grabs her dressing gown midway, slips in and presses the warming fabric to her crawling skin, planning to prepare some breakfast or at this time better said lunch.

As she opens the fridge she stares at practically nothing though. She realizes she didn't go grocery shopping since she's been back from Europe yet. After the whole disaster regarding Leila, groceries weren't really high on her list of priorities.

Sighing and mumbling annoyed cusses she closes the fridge and turns around again, she walks to her bathroom, takes a shower, brushes her teeth, applies her make-up, throws on some clothes and leaves her apartment, swinging a set of keys with her fingers.

It doesn't take long until she steps out of a supermarket with two filled bags balancing on her arms on the way back to her car she parked in the nearest possible lot.

She just wants to grab for the door handle of the passenger door as she's swept of her feet. The bags fall to the ground, the items scatter across the ground, some roll onto the street and get squashed by passing cars. Alex falls down to the sidewalk as well, but is able to cushion the fall with her arms until another body falls into her back and presses her prone into the pavement.

"Gee, fuck!", she screams still lying under the weight of another person, "open your fucking eyes!"

"Sorry, sorry", a familiar female voice reiterates in an apologetic tone and slowly the pressure on Alex's body starts to decrease as the other woman stands up, "you alright?"

Alex turns to the woman who reached a hand out to her in order to help her stand up. As she realizes who she knocked down she takes a step back though. It's a small world.

"Alex?"

Alex laughs hoarsely amused, stands back up and dusts the dirt off her clothes. "Hey, Piper."

Across her stands indeed the same blonde who bailed on her in the club last night, shifting uncomfortably from one leg to the other, panting heavily. Her blonde hair sticks out messy under a thin beanie. She wears long sweatpants, a tracksuit top and runners, some white earphones dangle out of her collar playing soft music. A thin layer of sweat covers her skin which is a lot paler than yesterday. Her eyes seem glazed as if some of yesterday's alcohol is still in her body system.

Piper is slim and seemed fit yesterday, but she wouldn't have thought of her as a runner. Now though she can't really stop herself from thinking about how gorgeous her toned legs probably look like.

"I get that I'm in your bad books now, but you don't have to knock me down because of that", Alex says sarcastically whereas Piper laughs awkwardly.

"Sorry, I've been lost in thought", Piper's gaze drops to the ground and switches to the groceries still scattered around the pavement. She inhales sharply between gritted teeth, "how much do I owe you?"

"Owe me?", Alex glances around confused, not grasping what Piper meant until she sees what she's staring at. She waves her hand in a refusing manner. "Nothing."

"Come on, how much?", Piper opens the zipper of her jacket and grabs into it to snatch her wallet out of an inside pocket.

"Piper", Alex says stern and shakes her head to brush the topic off until Piper tucks her wallet away and closes her jacket again.

They remain silent as Alex begins to grab a few things to put back into the bags which weren't broken by the fall. Piper shortly bents down to help her and Alex starts to ponder if she should apologize. She isn't the type for apologies. Even Kubra rarely gets apologies for when she screws things up and if he does they're usually followed by a sentence starting with but. And know that she thinks about it, she isn't even sorry for the kiss. No, she won't apologies for something she liked, for something what felt so good. For something she knew the blonde liked and wanted as well.

"Sorry again", Piper rips her out of her thoughts and shocks her with an added "also for yesterday."

Alex raises her eyebrows startled. Here she stands, considering if she should express an apology for last night and instead she gets one? She definitely didn't expect that. "Why?"

"I just scrammed… after… you know."

"Nevermind. I can't say I wasn't hurt", Alex chuckles softly, "but I guess I just misread the signals."

"Yeah…", Piper mumbles less than convincing and Alex sees how she fiddles with her ring yet again, staring off into nothing. No, I didn't misread anything, she thinks and smiles inwardly.

"Oh, by the way, I've got your jacket", Alex says incidentally as she opens her car and stows the remaining groceries away.

"Mh?" Piper's eyes shoot up and meet Alex's.

"Your jacket? You forgot at the club? I took it."

"Oh?"

"I live just a few blocks down the street", she says and points in the direction her apartment is located, "you could come along and get it."

Piper seems to contemplate, shakes her head though as she looks at her watch, "my break's almost over."

"What, you go running in your break?"

She shrugs and laughs shortly. "It was either that or being questioned about my hangover this morning."

"Lightweight, huh, kid?", Alex assumes smirking.

The blonde blinks and chuckles, "apparently."

Alex fetches a ballpen out of her pocket and steps closer to her, grabbing her hand. Piper wants to withdraw her hand startled and bewildered but Alex's grip is too firm. She scribbles a number in blue ink on the skin of Piper's palm.

"Just gimme a call when you've got time to get it", she whispers, her voice even more husky than usual and winks at her.

"Uh-huh", is Piper's only reaction in combination with one single nod and a slightly opened mouth, her eyes never leaving the digits.

Alex laughs again, turns around and steps back into the supermarket with a huge grin on her face while calling back a simple "bye, Pipes!"

New York City, New York
Brooklyn
Park Slope
06:53 PM

More or less punctual Piper opens the door to her house and calls out to her fiancé; "Larry?"

"Here", he calls back from the living room. She walks round the corner, still wearing her jacket. Larry sits on the couch and turns the TV off as she enters, then looks at her and frowns bewildered. "Why aren't you wearing a warmer jacket? You must be freezing out there."

Piper looks down at herself. Instead of her warm winter jacket she forgot at the club last night she wears a cardigan and windbreaker. "I left it at the bar."

"Shall I get it?", Larry instantly offers, "which bar were you?"

Piper shakes her head vehemently, "no, no. I'll get it later…" from Alex, she adds for herself and takes of her jacket, puts it away and sits beside Larry on the couch. "Let's talk first."

"Wow, straight to the point?"

"We can't put this off any longer."

Larry nods in agreement and rubs his forehead. "So, what do we need to talk about?"

What don't we need to talk about, Piper thinks shaking her head. But where to start she isn't really sure herself.

The biggest issue in their relationship is the work and everything related to it. The fact that Piper does lots of extra hours. The fact that Larry doesn't have a regular job.

And so this conversation starts with work as topic, too. It's rare that this topic doesn't end in a verbal fight, but Piper hopes for a miracle as she yet again lists all her reasons for her overtime, their very first issue of dispute. It are the same points as in every of their talks, but this time Larry listens, he doesn't interrupt her, doesn't gaze at her with a bugged look until she gets so annoyed herself that she simply changes into her sportswear and goes running.

Reason number one: It's part of her job. Simple as that. She told him the same thing yesterday and so many times before. She's a DEA Agent for crying out loud, if there's a case, there's a case. A fixed working schedule doesn't really matter when it's time to hunt down criminals. Every second you don't investigate, but waste away on the couch is a second the felon's chances to get away with his crime raises.

Larry listens, he nods, he agrees. Of course he agrees. He knew what he was getting into as they met. She told him that she's a cop and seeks a career at the DEA or FBI as soon as he asked her about her job. He knew what negative aspects come with that and he said that he'd support her. It was one of the things she loved about him. So many people began to act weird around her as soon as she told them her profession, but not Larry.

Reason number two: Money. Extra hours bring more money. Night shifts bring even more money. Money, Piper and Larry really need as she told him yesterday. The rent, though not excessive, is high. Good food needs to be bought, bills need to be paid. And neither Piper nor Larry craves for asking their parents for financial support in any way.

Again Larry listens, he nods, he agrees. And as always reason number two leads to issue of dispute number two:

Larry's job. Or more precisely that he doesn't have one. He's a journalist, an author, a freelance author. He jumps from paper to paper and hopes to be able to publish some articles, get an assignment or even a job as interim. It's not that Piper's really upset by him doing what he loves, she's always proud of her fiancé when he can convince a newspaper of publishing him. But it's one of the reasons money is tight. Which is a reason for Piper's extra hours. Which results in accusations on behalf of Larry. Which then causes Piper to point out the fact Larry doesn't have a real job. It's some fucked up doom loop.

Larry listens. Larry nods. Larry agrees.

And Piper is frustrated. "Don't you have nothing to say?"

"Your job takes a shitload of time and mine leads nowhere. What's left to say?"

She sighs and rubs her tired eyes. What leads nowhere is this conversation. "I want to solve our problems, not just talk about them."

"What am I supposed to do?"

"Get a fucking job!", Piper answers harsh, direct and without hesitation, whereat Larry rolls his eyes and shakes his head. She's so sick of this discussion, his stubbornness, this whole damned situation. "I don't say you have to give up writing, Larry. But we need regular income", she continues in a calmer voice.

"I'm searching for jobs almost daily."

"No, you're searching for assignments. That's a difference."

"Well, your cases would-"

"No", Piper interrupts him in an instant and raises a hand to signal him that that is an absolute no-go. They had this discussion way too often. It's almost as old as their work dispute, if not older. Put a journalist and a cop under a single roof? Of course this topic arises.

Piper told him in the very beginning that she has no authority to talk to the press about ongoing investigations without explicit permission. She mustn't even talk about close cases. Especially not if the press is her fiancé. That's not only a conflict of interests, it's exploitation. "We discussed this too often, Larry."

"You could at least recommend me."

"The publicists have their own heads, Larry. That's power play. It's about politics not sympathy."

He nods. He understands. He is frustrated. A feeling Piper shares. She could talk with him about all these topics for hours and hours and it'd still end in absolutely nothing. It'll never change. It won't change today either.

Sometime in the middle of this somehow pointless talk Larry asks her about the number written on her palm. The digits are blurry, the blue paint faint because of the shower she took after running in her break, but it's still legible. She didn't attach any value to the number after she'd written it on a piece of paper below the name Alex and stuck it on the edge of her monitor with a small smile on her face. Nicky observed it in silence which surprised Piper. But she knows exactly that her foul-mouth of a colleague had her own thoughts about it and would take her up on it later.

"Just a lead in the current case", Piper mumbles and suddenly asks herself, when she started to lie to her fiancé.

As expected the conversation headed nowhere. It has been the same old arguments, the same old discussion. The only real difference was that this time none of them raised the voice and Piper didn't flee the house. Some progress at least, but none that matters.

She didn't bring up Alex either. In her opinion there's nothing to bring up after all and would only strain their relationship more. She saw her once at a bar, bumped then into her while running and will visit her to get her jacket back, that's all, there is no more and there will be no more.

But that's not important now as she sits on a barstool next to her wild haired colleague and good friend Nicky one day later like she promised and listens to her telling a joke she said she was told by Red. It's not their usual bar they visit after work with some of the other colleagues like Big Boo, who takes care of the drug-sniffing dogs, or Pornstache, the corrupt senior agent.

It's the bar they go to when they want a rest from the DEA pack or need a place to talk without anyone putting his or her two cents in. This is the bar where they never talk about work. Sometimes you simply need a healthy and absolute distance to that specific topic.

"…and the penguin says; dude, he's not an eggplant, he's retarded!", Nicky finishes her joke and Piper snorts with laugher until an older red-haired woman sitting across a tall black lady at the next table speaks up.

"You lost me at the umbrella."

Confused Nicky turns around and faces the woman, for a moment Piper thinks she's going to explain the joke to the stranger, but then Nicky shakes her head and concentrates her attention back to Piper. "So… Back to your party."

Piper just nods. Of course Nicky wouldn't tarry long to go back to that particular topic. She takes a mental note to bug her about Lorna Morello as revenge when the time's right. "What d'you wanna know?", she sighs and nips at her margarita. At least she learned from two nights ago not to down her drink in one. Or the following ones for that matter.

"Was a certain guy named Alex and a certain phone number involved with it?", she asks with a big grin. There's that question Piper waited twenty-four hours for Nicky to ask.

Piper's first reaction is to want to correct her and say that Alex is not some certain guy but a certain hot and tall brunette. But then her gaze drifts to the entrance for a second. What are the fucking odds?!

"What's wrong?", Nicky asks and turns to the direction Piper looks at where a woman and a man enter the bar. Nothing special. She faces Piper again. "Chapman?"

"That's… Alex…."

to be continued…
Broken III

izzielg: Your wish is my command! You have to be a little bit more patient with Larry though. But I promise it's all inevitable.

Guest: Had a good laugh even without the intention.