A/N- So, what was that, a week? That's not too bad, right? :) Thanks to everyone who left a review. I'm horrible at responding to them, but I appreciate everyone who takes the time to write one (and everyone who doesn't... seriously thanks for reading). In my last A/N I forgot to thank Vausemaniac for letting me bounce ideas about this thing off her what feels like about 20 years ago and ensuring me that this didn't sound like a completely insane idea. Also thanks to The Person Who Read This for me to make sure it made some semblance of sense... if not for them I'd probably still be editing and fretting over it. So thanks for that and the always boundless enthusiasm... makes me feel like I'm actually halfway decent at this... Anyway... I'll shut up now... (PS this is all a flashback from last chapter but I didn't italicize it or anything because it's long and I figured it might be distracting)

Once Upon a Time in the West

FIVE YEARS EARLIER

Alex really should've known better. Instincts... her instincts had been scrambled. She'd been drinking (of course she had). hadn't noticed which way they were riding... hadn't noticed for how long they'd been riding (... for miles and miles... passing through unforgiving scrublands and hardscrabble settlements populated by shady men...). But Alex had been lost in the haze of drink, in the haze of memories. She'd been replaying the events of the past few weeks again and again, in her mind's eye. The whiskey hadn't erased it. the whiskey had just made her melancholy. the whiskey had just mixed it all up with memories of earlier tragedies (too many at her own hands)... earlier failures... the dead never really left her alone but god damn they'd been getting so much louder of late...

She hadn't even taken note of the staggered line of horses coming to a halt, her own slowing of its own accord as the others did. hadn't really registered anything until two pairs of strong hands were gripping her around the right arm (her weak arm...), pulling hard, tearing her from the horse, throwing her to the ground with enough force to stun her. And combined with the drink and the exhaustion, she was too disoriented to fight back as they disarmed her, pulling her pistols from her belt... then they'd lifted her as roughly as they'd thrown her down and half-dragged, half-carried her into the broken down building they'd stopped in front of...

... a church... fuckin' irony...

There'd been not a tick of hesitation once they were inside. A space had been cleared out... broken down rotted out pews pushed to the side... they pushed her into the center of it and without a note of preamble, the six of them (some she'd been riding with for years now), proceeded to do their damndest to beat her to death...

It was the blow to the face with the broken bottle that finally made her fall down, and she'd taken down half the gang before they'd managed to get her on the dirty floor of the drafty church in the middle of fucking nowhere. Two of them were dead, greenhorns so new to the gang that she barely knew or cared what their damn names were. Fallen to her knife and her fists respectively. Stella the Dingo was still breathing, but it wasn't going to last long. She'd come at Alex with her little flaying knife (the last thing many a man had seen) and had actually fit in a few blows before Alex had stabbed her in the shoulder with her gigantic Bowie knife and kicked her hard in the ribs with her boot. She had gone flying into a brick wall... there'd been a crunch, and then the spry little girl hadn't been so lively anymore...

The pain was tremendous and her vision was suddenly clouded... her glasses had flown off at some point... there was blood in her eyes wet and heavy... now she was down, the pain from the two dozen other blows she'd taken (stab wounds, at least one bullet... maybe two... she wasn't really counting) was catching up with her, fuzzing up her brain... making her limbs feel like ten ton weights...

Gritting her teeth, she tried to get up, but caught a boot in the side for her trouble... "Keep your carcass on that floor, Vause," Mendez's voice spat... he kicked her again in the stomach... against her will a groan tore from her lungs along with all the breath there and she could do nothing but curl up in a ball, cursing her own fucking weakness...

Her consciousness was fading, but she heard the door open... heard footsteps on the creaking floorboards, saw a pair of fine handmade, impossibly shiny boots arrive smack in front of her... and then their owner crouched down in front of her...

...Kubra Balik... dark brown eyes like a bottomless void, full of disappointment, full of anger...

"Alex... Alex... you are such a disappointment to me... so much potential... so much fire... and then you betray me..." he shook his head, "You know I could not let it pass..." he sighed. Kubra wasn't so high on flowery speeches. He wanted Alex to know he had done this and that it had been because she'd failed him. That was all. He stood up and walked towards the door, the others trailing behind him, leaving behind the dead and dying. It didn't surprise her. If her time with him had taught her anything, it was that there was no honor amongst thieves (leastways not his brand of thieves)... ever...

She tried to move, tried to will herself into action, but once she'd hit the floor and Mendez had kicked her, it was like all the fire had left her...

Kubra was at the door when he turned... "Oh and please... do make sure to die. If you somehow manage to survive this... I will make quite sure that you regret it."

Lorna was the first one to start talking about stopping. She always was. Girl hated overnight rides, couldn't sleep on her horse like everyone else. Rosa would've been annoyed about it, but even she had to admit she was fucking exhausted. Their last job had been tense... the bank itself had been easy enough to knock over, but the town sheriff had reacted much faster than they'd expected, and they'd nearly lost Maxwell and Marco before they'd managed to lose the bastard and his deputies. It was a wonder all seven of them had escaped intact.

They'd ridden hard after that, trying to put as much distance between them and the town as they could. They'd been at a full gallop until the horses were about ready to collapse, and even then they'd kept going. It had been near on four hours, and they were all about to fall over.

Ruiz had scoffed, snorting something about how she was surprised Lorna didn't want to get back to Haven to drool over Nichols again, which earned her a scowl from the little Italian. Flores grunted at Ruiz that sleep didn't sound so bad and Cindy, who had been about to fall off her horse seconded it. Rosa growled at them all to shut the fuck up and started leading them to the nearest shelter. She hadn't used the place for awhile, but she figured if there was someone else there they could just move along.

The old church was just how she remembered it. She sent Flores up to scout it and she returned to declare that no one was lurking about outside in any obvious way. Rosa nodded and they advanced towards the place. She had the others stop and then went forward with Ruiz at her side to scout out the inside.

The second she pushed open the door she could feel there was something wrong... Ruiz, always suspicious of everything, felt it too. Rosa glanced at her then gestured them forward guns at the ready. They crept quietly from the small foyer into the chapel itself...

Ruiz sucked in a breath, "Dios mio..."

Rosa frowned at the sight in front of her. "Fucking hell..." she glanced at Ruiz, "Get the others..."

Lorna was crouching by the unconscious gunfighter, frowning, "Well she ain't dead... least not yet. From all I can tell she will be pretty quick less we get her to a doc..."

"Nearest doc..." Marco's eyebrows knit, "we'd practically have to go all the way back to Haven... take her to the Nun..."

"Why we have to take her anywhere?" muttered Ruiz, "we all know Vause... we all know what she does, who she's running with... world might be better off without that kind in it..."

Lorna frowned, "She and Nicky are friends... Old Lady Chapman..."

"Bein' friends with Nichols didn't mean much when she ran off with that pig fucker Balik after her mom died," Ruiz replied, "Maybe she used to be someone worth a damn, but now..." she turned to Rosa, "You know what Balik does... you know how his people are..."

Cindy frowned, "She a bad bitch, yeah, but she never did nothin' to any of us." She'd known Alex Vause for years. Mama Berdie would send she and the other girls down to the Chapman ranch to play and to "learn a little responsibility" by working around the farm. Alex had always been around, and she and Cindy would roughhouse while they were pretending to work.

"She runs with Balik," Ruiz repeated, "don't care who she was before, that's all she is now..."

"Ten gets you one, Balik is the one who did this," Rosa said, cutting Cindy's next argument off. She gestured around at the other bodies, three of them. Maxwell and Flores had already gone over them for anything useful. "Those are his men as well... and that one," she gestured to the small female, "has Vause's knife in her back..."

"How do you know that's Vause's knife?"

"Because I was there when Old Lady Chapman gave it to her," Rosa frowned. She was looking down intently at the half dead outlaw, a hard, thoughtful look on her face. Everyone held their breath... they'd said their pieces, now it was time for them to listen. Finally, Rosa sighed, "We take her to the Nun," she looked at Ruiz, "I know why you're worried, but in her state, even if she is still with Balik, she won't be in any condition to either fight us or run back to him. And if she's not still with him, then Balik did this and she's not his anymore..."

"Snake is still a snake... and most snakes are better off dead..." muttered Ruiz.

"Might could be," Rosa said, "But I've known this girl since she was the size of a loaf of bread... her life ain't been easy, and when she run off... well, I suppose she had her reasons..." she glanced up at Ruiz, a wry smile on her face, "she actually liked her mother, Maria..." she looked back down at Alex, "she deserves a chance to at least explain herself... and she don't deserve to die alone, I reckon..."

Ruiz sighed heavily, but knew the matter was closed. Rosa gestured, "Come on... Cindy, Marco, get her up... carefully," she looked over at Ruiz, Flores and Maxwell, "You three, stay here. Bury the bodies... all of them. And make an extra pile of dirt, right? Don't mark any of the graves..."

Maxwell nodded, all business as usual. Flores followed. Ruiz frowned, "No we gotta dig holes for this scum? Put 'em down in the ground like they deserve that..."

Rosa frowned at her, switching entirely to Spanish as she spoke, "Little girl, if your father hadn't saved my life, I swear that fuckin' mouth of yours would've lost you yours by now... You been ridin' with me for neigh on four years now... you're goin' to tell me you don't trust me and the way I do things?"

The other woman grimaced, glaring at the floor, knowing she had no way out here. Rosa was the boss because she'd proven herself at every turn. She'd made them all a lot of money, and she treated them all like family. Finally, she nodded once, curtly.

"Now, I don't got to explain myself to you at all, ever, but I'm gonna do it this time just so you don't sit there steaming like a tiny child all night... we dig four graves out there, it looks like four people are died in this place and someone was kind enough to send them on their way. And that means Kubra will think Vause's dead... I know he's a paranoid son of a whore, but I don't think even he's paranoid enough to dig up four graves just to make sure one of 'em is actually her... you understand now?"

Another short nod.

"Good... now go help them dig the fuckin' holes. ."

The doc was a nun, no one quite knew where she'd learned her trade (or how she'd ended up out here, but then the past wasn't much discussed around Haven) they just knew she was good enough to keep them all alive and, most times, in one piece. Rosa, Cindy and Lorna had shown up at her door. Ruiz and Flores had gone back to their rooms with Gloria at the general store. Marco and Maxwell were at Rosa's cabin in the foothills four miles outside of town, checking their own injuries.

the nun worked out of the back room of the apothecary next to the general store. she lived quiet and frugal and after a certain period where everyone was wary she might start pontificating at them all, she'd integrated nicely into the town. they knew she didn't always approve of them, but they also knew she wasn't one to judge.

Sister Ingalls shook her head, "This girl has an angel looking out for her..."

Rosa made a scoffing sound. the Nun frowned at her, "I know you don't believe, Rosa but..."

"Oh it's not just me, Sister... if Vause was awake, she'd tell you that she and the angels don't get along so well..."

"Well perhaps she ought to reconsider that," the Nun said, "because with as bad as these injuries are, she should be dead. Probably should've been dead before you even found her..."

The door to the exam room opened and Jones, who ran the apothecary, walked in, carrying a pile of clean linens which she set next to the basin of hot water. "though even now, it's going to take some care to ensure she survives. I removed the bullet from her shoulder, I'm cleaning her wounds, stitching them up, but there's not a whole lot I can do about whatever's going on inside. There'll probably be some infection, and she'll just have to fight through it..."

"What d'ya think the chances are?" asked Lorna, who had apprenticed a little under the Nun herself. She knew Sister Ingalls didn't necessarily approve of Lorna using her teachings to do field repairs for a bunch of bank robbers, but there wasn't so much she could do about it.

"I can't say. A lot depends on the person. On how tough they are... it's not as exact as I might like..."

Rosa allowed a smile to appear on her face, "Well, if toughness is what it takes, then she'll survive... too fuckin' stubborn not to..."

Alex was laid up for a month. Long enough for the cool of autumn to transform into the beginnings of what Jones the Apothecary said she felt in her bones was going to be a bad winter. "Real bad..." Jones was eccentric, but she was rarely wrong about such matters (no one ever knew how exactly she sensed this shit).

She spent two weeks fighting off infection and healing her insides, tossing and turning and sweating and muttering nonsense in the Nun's rooms while Jones fed her remedies and herbs. After two weeks, she opened her eyes. She was still in some pain, still weak as a kitten... she had the ability to talk, but wasn't being forthcoming (though that wasn't unusual). Once they knew she was awake, Nicky insisted she come to stay at Red's.

The Nun let her go with the promise to visit her at least once a day to see how things were coming along, and Vasily and Maxim helped Alex, who hadn't said more than a dozen odd words to anyone, limp painfully slowly across the way to the brothel wincing in pain with every step. After they got her installed in one of the rooms Red reserved for her family and comfortable as she was going to be, Nicky came upstairs with a bowl of something Russian and warm and laid it on a tray in front of Alex.

They sat in silence for a few long moments while Alex shoveled the food in her mouth slowly, deliberately. Her stomach still wasn't on even keel, her appetite not entirely back... the Nun told her it might be a fair bit before it was. Nicky watched her eat, expression unreadable. When she was done, Nicky pulled the tray back, set it on the floor next to the bed, and looked Alex in the eye intently.

"Don't suppose you got anything to say for yourself?"

Alex's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly, which made the right side of her face, the one Mendez had slashed with the bottle, the one still bandaged tight, ache. Her eyes flicked away out the window for a moment then back. She stayed silent. She knew Nicky would say her piece eventually.

Nicky glared at her, "You're a fuckin' asshole, you know?" Straight to the point. Always.

"Mmhmm," Alex said, bobbing her head once.

"Fuckin' takin' off like that... we thought you were dead... then after we found out what you were up to... we hoped it..."

Alex nodded again, mouth in a hard line.

"I know what happened fucked you up, Vause, but you... what you did... it wasn't right... we were your friends... your family... you basically were tellin' us all to fuck off..."

Alex felt the shame of it rising up her throat like bile. She wasn't near at her full strength yet, and every word Nicky spoke seemed like it was draining something from her.

"I mean, fuck... Old Lady Chapman... she wanted to saddle up and put out a search party... thought you'd been kidnapped by the fuckin' natives for fuck's sake... And the Old Man... you know he would never say nothin' but..."

Alex couldn't keep silent anymore, "Nicky..." her voice came out half a whisper, raw with emotion and disuse...

"No you're gonna listen..."

"I know what I did..." she said, "I know it... I ain't... I ain't proud... of it... of any of it!"

"Then why the fuck did you do it?" Nicky growled, her usually sardonic humor gone entirely, voice and manner angry and anguished in equal measures.

Alex shook her head. She was silent for another long moment then, "Because my ma was gone, Nicky... she was fuckin' gone and she wasn't ever gonna come back, and I tried so fucking hard to save her and I failed... and I was... I was angry at Celeste for... for stoppin' me.." she hated it. hated talking about it, even to Nicky who had always been one of the very few people she could talk to. She could feel the tears welling up and the frustration and terror of that day crawling back up her brain, clawing its way into her heart... she had spent six god damn years forgetting... drowning in drink and rage... and now... now she had to look at it, to examine it from every angle... she swiped angrily at her eyes and was confronted with the sight of her right arm... the angry burn scar that covered it from wrist to elbow. the constant reminder of her failure to save her mother... suddenly it felt like a lead weight was falling through her soul. she was twenty four but she felt about eighty...

"Vause..." Nicky's voice was gentler now, "there wasn't a thing you could do. by the time anyone got to the barn, the fire was... the fire was out of control, if you'd gone in there you just woulda died too... Celeste was savin' your life..."

"I'd have been better off dyin'... " she met Nicky's eyes, "and the Nun would've been better off lettin' me..."

"God damn you, don't talk about yourself like you don't matter to no one anymore... I loved your ma too, but she ain't the only one cared about you..."

"You shouldn't... you don't know..." her gray green eyes clouded over, seemed to grow three shades darker, her voice was low, almost frightened, "...the things I did, Nicky... the things I did were..." she closed her eyes, her voice a whisper now, Nicky could barely hear her, "...the things I'm capable of... no one worth anything could possibly be capable of things like that... no decent folk should have to be around them..."

"Look around this place, Vause... you think any of us is really any better'n you?"

"I don't know if that's a majority opinion... Rosa came to see me after I woke up yesterday... I saw how she was lookin' at me..."

"You know Rosa. She thought you weren't worth savin' she'd have left you where you were..."

"Maybe... don't mean everyone else..."

"Fuck everyone else. They want you gone, they come through Red..."

Alex frowned, "Don't lie, Nicky. Red ain't a fool. I saw the way she looked at me too," she allowed herself the ghost of a fond smile, "Got a feelin' you have a lot more to do with me bein' here'n she does..." the smile disappeared as fast as it had come, as though it had never been, "Red don't trust me, and I don't blame her... I wouldn't trust me, either, I were her... " she shook her head once, hard, "... don't trust myself, even now..."

Nicky shrugged, "Well... I mean, wants to know you ain't plannin' on runnin' off and re-joining a bunch of murderin' thieves any time soon... She wants to know how you ended up where Rosa found you..."

Alex sighed, "It don't make a lick of difference why or how I got there... things I've done... I ain't worth anyone's time or effort..."

"I keep telling you, we've all done things..." Nicky sighed and stood up, "I thought when you left... that you were dead, and I was so fuckin' mad at you for a long time," she tilted her head, eyes staring intently into Alex's, "I thought I'd wanna know why you left Kubra or what happened, but seein' you... I see it don't matter, just like nobody's past here matters... you ain't the same person you were before you left, but you also don't look a thing like a stone cold killer either... not that I think you ever really were... I'm... glad to see you and fuck off if you think I'm plannin' on letting you slip off in the middle of the night again... Haven's all about fresh starts, Alex, that's the whole god damn point..."

She took the tray and walked back towards the door, "I'll let you rest... the Nun says you're going to need awhile to get back to full strength..."

And with that, she disappeared out the door, leaving Alex alone with her dark, swirling thoughts and the lingering shadow of her friends' words.

Piper Chapman was stubbornly determined to make this work. It was not proving an easy task, although she hadn't suspected it would be. And were it not for her grandmothers' constant faith and encouragement it might have been even more difficult. But... Celeste needed her, and Piper was determined to be there, to stand up, to be strong, to prove herself for once in her life... It was so rare in her life that she had been truly relied upon by someone and it was both terribly frightening and wonderfully exhilarating.

And of course... there was her mother. Or more properly, the need to prove that her mother was wrong about her, about this entire endeavor. She had scoffed when Piper had volunteered to go out West to help Celeste with her ranch after her husband died. Carol Chapman had made clear to her daughter exactly what she believed the outcome of this "passing fancy" of hers would be: she wouldn't prove equal to the task of even existing in such "uncivilized" conditions for even a week, and she would be begging Celeste to put her on a train back home (in truth, Carol was probably not overjoyed with the prospect of having to explain Piper's absence to her friends). Her father had been just as ambivalent, but Piper's recent... behavior had been so disappointing to him that he simply wanted her away from him for a time.

It wasn't that she was not up to the challenge, that wasn't it at all it was simply that anyone faced with such a massive change in circumstances would feel a bit... out of sorts. Celeste assured her that she had gone through much the same when she had first arrived here. "It will get better, darling, you just need to give it time..."

She had been considered quite progressive in Boston (much to her father's dismay... so much of what she did seemed to be much to his dismay), the member of many ladies' societies that had ever so scandalous ideas. But she was still from a very different world than the people of Haven, and she had to try very hard not to make assumptions about them. The rules here were also so very different from what she was accustomed to, and she had learned that her tendency to speak for long stretches unbidden when she was nervous or out of sorts was, possibly, not the most advantageous strategy.

It had been a month, which wasn't necessarily a long period of time, but she didn't feel as though she had integrated well into the town. They were polite enough, but they all seemed to be somewhat bemused by her manner of speech and her clothes... except for the woman who tended bar the saloon next to the whorehouse, who had told her she was from New York and had been raised in a townhouse in Park Slope. (Piper had been quite astonished when, on her second day there, her grandmother had brought her to the saloon for lunch, although whether this was because it was a saloon or because it was next to a whorehouse, she wasn't sure... perhaps some combination of the two).

"Don't worry about it, Chapman," the woman, Nicky, had told her, "Just be yourself. They'll get used to you eventually... might even learn to like you, as long as you don't get too uppity about things..."

"Uppity?" Piper felt as though she was being insulted, but Nicky was grinning at her amiably enough. The blonde looked to Celeste, who just smiled at her.

"You know what I mean, Blondie," Nicky grinned at her. "Take on airs. Act like you're better than everyone else..."

"Ah... well that wasn't something I had planned," she sat up a little straighter, putting on what she hoped was a steadfast and determined expression, "I came here to help my grandmother and experience the West, not to be coddled."

Nicky nodded, "That's good. Cause there ain't a whole lot of coddling to go 'round in Haven..." someone bellied up to the bar and waved to get Nicky's attention. She nodded in that direction then turned back briefly to Piper, "Good luck... I know Old Lady Chapman here will show you the way..." she took a step towards the bar and then added, "Oh, and if you want to make things a damn sight easier on yourself, don't insult the food, hmmm?" and then she was gone.

And so she had been doing her best not to offend anyone, to learn how to deal with people. Most weren't much for what Celeste called "airs", the sort false friendliness that people like those in Piper's social circle in Boston always wore like armor, smiling and nodding at people they loathed, always trying to keep up appearances. As rebellious as Piper had been considered by her mother and the clucking hens in her sewing circle, she was still much more entrenched in such things than the people of this town. The way they spoke, the way they acted, the way they dealt with others. It was all foreign to her, but most people were amiable enough to her, and seemed to understand she was trying.

"No one here can judge anyone else, dear," Celeste said, "That's what this town is about: second chances and acceptance."

In addition to navigating an entirely new social system, Piper was also thrown headlong into day to day life on a ranch, with all that such life inferred.

She was doing the kind of physical labor she had never been tasked with in her life, had never even contemplated doing. It wasn't that such things were below her (unlike her mother, she was always open to new experiences), but she had never been given the opportunity. She rose at 5am, ate breakfast, then worked all day alongside her grandmother and her hired man, James Ford. (Unlike some hired hands, Ford didn't live on the ranch. He lived up in town at the stables with his wife, Berdie and the three girls who helped run the stables with them. Ford also served as a deputy on the rare occasions Sheriff Bennett needed more help than his deputy, Fischer, could give him.)

Her grandmother kept all the requisite farm animals (chickens, goats, pigs, a pair of horses), along with a dozen head of cattle, who slept in the big barn and spent their long days in the fields across the small creek that ran behind the ranch house. There were plenty of tasks involving the animals, as well as maintaining the farm (somehow at least part of the vast wooden fence marking off Celeste's property was always falling apart) and doing household chores (Celeste didn't employ a maid, her theory being that she was more than capable of doing such things herself... Carol would likely have fallen over dead if she'd been told she had to live in such a desolate fashion.)

By the time the work was done and they sat down to supper (sometimes at the ranch house, sometimes at the saloon, and a few times at Ford's table, with his wife and their little 'family') Piper was quite ready to collapse from exhaustion. In Boston, she would often find herself staying awake until almost midnight, usually reading, but since she'd been in Haven, she'd barely read at all (a deplorable condition that had led her to feeling quite demoralized) because she'd as good as fainted as soon as she was finished eating, sometimes as early as eight o'clock in the evening.

Tonight, she was at the bar by herself. Celeste had gone to visit with some of her old friends at the apothecary's. She was sitting at the bar, slumped over a plate of meat and potatoes that was actually quite delicious. Her head was leaned tiredly on her left hand and she was staring listlessly at the food as she shoved it round the plate with her fork. She was snapped of her exhaustion induced trance by the now familiar bray of Nicky Nichols.

"Ay, Blondie you all right there?"

Piper lifted her eyes to look at the bushy haired bartender (it felt like all too much effort to actually raise her head from her hand). She had been quite bothered by the nickname when she'd first arrived, her temper flaring every time Nicky used it, but eventually she had learned that the more irritated she became, the more gleeful Nicky had become. After about a week, she had given up being annoyed by it. Celeste had assured her that Nicky wasn't making light of her (at least not any moreso than she did anyone else), that this was just her way of relating to everyone.

"Hmmm?" she managed.

"You look like you've been kicked in the head by a mule, kid," Nicky's wide brown eyes were sympathetic, and she was giving Piper her gentlest, most understanding sardonic smirk.

"Wha?"

"You been trying to make your food into abstract art for the past half hour. You keep wasting her food, Red's gonna get real sore..."

"Oh..." Piper said, trying to focus her eyes, "All right..." she listlessly took a forkful of potatoes and put them in her mouth, chewing mechanically.

"Seriously, Chapman, are you doing all right?"

Piper sighed, "I suppose..." her guard was down and her emotions were up, so she once she began thinking of it, she couldn't stop, "I just feel as though I'm not... making any progress... I'm so tired all the time... and everything is so very sore... perhaps I'm doing something wrong..."

"Has Old Lady Chapman said anything about it?" asked Nicky, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, no..."

"Look, Blondie," Nicky her voice now serious and sympathetic, "If you were doing badly, your grandmother would say so. That woman don't cut any corners, and she don't soften blows for anyone, not even Red... she hasn't said anything to you it's cause you're doing all right..."

"But..."

"Nah no buts!" Nicky said, "Look, when you first came here, I admit I had some doubts... I mean we were takin' bets on how fast you'd run off cryin' back to Boston..."

Piper found enough strength to glare at her...

"... but you proved us wrong... I mean, you've only been here near on a month and you're already toughening up. I mean, look at your hands! You got the beginnings of some real actual callouses there... And yeah you're exhausted, but not near so much as you were that first week. Why I remember there were times that first week that you wouldn't even come down here cause Celeste said you were too fuckin' tired. So yeah... you're still learnin' the ropes, and you've still got aways to go, but you're makin' progress, you know? We all had a hard time when we first came here. You just gotta keep on workin'... you'll get there..."

Piper half smiled, genuinely touched, "Thank you, Nicky..."

"Anytime, Chapman..." she poured Piper out a beer, "On the house... you know, to celebrate you still bein' here and in one piece after a whole month...'

Piper, who didn't normally drink (and for good reason) looked at the beer, thinking about refusing it, but then took it and raised it slightly before sipping it deeply. They sat in amiable silence for as Piper finished her food, feeling somewhat brighter after all Nicky had said... yes... perhaps she could do this... perhaps this would all work out after all...

And honestly, she thought, darkness returning to her thoughts , if only briefly, it wasn't as though she had a great deal to look forward to if she went back... not after all that had happened... not after the way she had left...

Alex spent the two weeks after she woke up eating Red's food, getting her strength back up, reading (it felt like it had been years since she'd read anything of substance, and she found she'd missed it… it was always relaxing for her…), and talking with Nicky or Red almost every day. The conversations weren't always pleasant and none of them had ever been particularly good with expressing anything personal, but by the end of the fortnight, they'd hashed a few things out. Nicky still wasn't happy with the way Alex had run off, but she thought she understood now, and Red was satisfied that Alex was well and truly on the outs with Kubra.

That conversation had been tense, only a day after Alex had woken. Red's questions so unrelenting and harsh that Nicky had said, "MA! Lay off her… she can barely move…"

Red had turned to her, eyes blazing. She was not one to coddle, and she rarely forgave. Alex knew deep down that a large part of the reasons the old Russian was even tolerating her presence here (maybe the only reason) was because Nicky had talked her into it. Nicky was one of the few people Red had any real soft spot for (she loved the girl more than she loved her own sons, or at least as much as she loved anyone). Nicky cared about Alex, and therefore Red was willing to allow a few concessions to her… but there wouldn't be a whole passel of forgiving and forgetting until the air got cleared… and until Alex had kept on the straight and narrow for a while. Trust was to be earned... trust started with honesty, and when Red was involved, honesty started with harsh questions…

"Nyet," growled Red, "No 'laying off'. She is fortunate she is even here and not sleeping in the Nun's back room, da? Being fed my food rather than that rabbit feed Jones calls 'meals'. She is fortunate we even let her back into town…"

"Red… she's one of us…"

"Was one of us… do not pretend you weren't just as angry at her as the rest of us, hmmm?"

Nicky looked away, grimacing. "Yeah, but…"

"But nothing… you forgive too easily when it comes to this one... too understanding... too much history to think clearly. She answers the questions, then I decide whether she stays under my roof. And I talk to the others if anyone wants to question it… understand?"

Nicky's jaw was set, but Alex spoke up, her voice still raspier than usual from disuse and general weakness, "S'alright, Nick. I deserve any questions Red's got…" She didn't say out loud that she was pretty sure she deserved much worse than she was getting, but Nicky was already angry enough, and she didn't want to make her friend feel like she had to defend her. Finally, Nicky blew out a frustrated breath and went back to sit in the chair in the corner.

Red faced Alex, "This," she gestured at Alex's general state, "this means you are done?"

"With Kubra? Completely. I mean… I was getting' there anyway… all the things he done… that he made me do… it… it started to wear on me. Wear on me in a way even the whiskey couldn't kill… but after he tried to end me… well, I ain't feelin' so cordial towards him…"

"And do you believe he will be coming to find you?"

"Reckon he thinks I'm dead," Alex said, "When he left I was a hop and a skip from it…"

"So he won't bring trouble on us?"

"Never knew where I was from in the first place. Never told him…"

The conversation continued for another hour after that, Alex confessing all her sins to Red, just as she'd done to Nicky. Red grimacing in a way that indicated she might be regretting this altogether… eventually, she left Alex with a hard look, "Okay for now… da? But one foot out of line, ubiytsa…" she hadn't added anything. She hadn't needed to.

Every day now, Alex would get up and walk a little, and though there were still times she felt weak as newborn foal, and she got tired much easier than she liked, it felt nice to be moving. It was exactly a month after she'd nearly died that she finally decided to go see Celeste. She'd asked about Nicky about her a couple times during their daily talks, trying to hide how disappointed she was that she hadn't come to check on her (outside of Nicky, Celeste was the only person she really wanted to see). Nicky had cocked an eyebrow, "She knows you're here… knows you're alive. I went out and told her when Rosa brought you into town… then again when you woke up… She said she reckoned you'd come out to see her when you were ready…"

(She knew Old Man Chapman… Big Dan… was dead… had died nearly two months ago… the first time she'd cried in years was when Nicky had told her that and Alex had known she'd never be able to make amends with him…)

Alex had been putting it off, telling herself she needed to be stronger, more healthy (at least until her face had healed up fully… the bandage had come off (the Nun insisting it needed to breathe) but that whole side of her face was pink and sensitive and rapidly scarring), but eventually she couldn't stand the waiting anymore. Her fear was that Celeste would reject her out of hand, tell her she never wanted to see her again, tell her she was a coward for leaving, a monster for all she'd done while she was gone… Nicky said she hadn't given Celeste details, but Alex knew Celeste wasn't stupid, and could put two and two together. Celeste knew what men like Kubra did. What he had the people who worked for him do…

But she'd woken up that morning determined not to leave it any more. To get it over with. She was no coward, and she deserved whatever Celeste was going to throw at her… even if it was bad… even if it tore what little was left of her heart out.

So she got dressed in the new outfit Nicky had brought her, made by the tall, skinny Mexican girl who worked as a seamstress out of a room at Mendoza's rooming house. (When Alex had given her a look like she didn't have to, Nicky had said, "What you want us to let you run around in them blood stained rags?" and Alex had been forced to concede that she was right). She borrowed a horse from Red's boys (normally she'd have walked the mile and a half out to the ranch, but she still wasn't altogether confident in her ability to get out there without falling down), and she'd ridden west, breathing deeply and trying not to think dark thoughts about what the ultimate end of the conversation to come might be.

When she arrived at the Chapman ranch, she dismounted and set the horse she'd borrowed up to the hitching post out front. Seeing the old place was a like a punch to the gut, the old memories both good and bad, slamming into her harder than she'd thought they would. She had to swallow to keep her emotions from rising up and overwhelming her. It had been so many years since she'd seen the place… it seemed as though it hadn't changed a lick.

She'd arrived early, so she reckoned Celeste would be in the kitchen, preparing breakfast for herself and maybe one of her two hands (unlike most ranchers out here, her hands didn't live with her; Ford and Fischer both lived up in town. Celeste didn't need them all year round or every day, so they had other jobs as well. And she took care of all her cooking and cleaning herself… Celeste was nothing if not self-sufficient).

She walked up to the door and closed her eyes for a long moment. Then she opened the screen door, raised her hand and knocked three times, firmly.

After a moment, she heard footsteps approaching. The door opened… and Alex's breath caught in her throat.

It wasn't Celeste who stood on the other side of the door. It was another woman. Just looking at her, Alex could tell she was from back East, and not just back East, but from money back East. Old money… the kind of money Celeste herself had come from. It didn't matter the girl was dressed in a pair of pants and a sturdy work shirt, and that her hands had seen some honest work of late (though if the redness and blisters evident were any sign, it was maybe the first honest work they'd ever seen). Her bearing and finishing school posture, the tilt of her chin, the way she held her self, even just standing there… all of it spoke to her privileged upbringing. Her golden blonde hair was tied up, and her blue eyes were looking at Alex with an air of polite confusion.

For her part, Alex was struck momentarily speechless… the blonde was possibly the most beautiful woman she'd had ever seen, her blue eyes conveying intelligence and only the slightest of surprise at the way Alex was dressed (she assumed the girl had been around town a bit, and had probably seen plenty of women dressed like gunfighters, though possibly not anyone who looked quite so battered as she did...).

The woman was looking at her, head tilted slightly to the side. A look of wary, polite curiosity on her face. "Is there some way I might help you?" she asked.

"Um…" Alex cleared her throat, remembering the purpose of her visit, momentarily putting aside the fact that she was standing in front of a beautiful woman, "I… I'm looking for Celeste… I mean… Mrs. Chapman…"

The blonde frowned, confused, "Just a moment please…" but before she could turn to fetch Celeste, the woman herself emerged from the direction of the kitchen saying, "Piper dear what…"

When she saw Alex, she stopped in her tracks, staring at her, the look in her eyes unreadable. Alex stood up a little straighter and said, "Hello, ma'am…" belatedly, she pulled off her hat and held it in her hands, fidgeting with it nervously in a way she never did around anyone else. But Celeste wasn't just anyone. Celeste had known her practically since she was born. And Alex was acutely aware of how her actions must have hurt her. "… I'm… I came to…" she ran a hand through her hair, and averted her eyes, staring at the floor, frustrated, "I came to say I'm… I'm sorry, I didn't…"

Before she could continue, she suddenly felt a pair of arms wrapping around her tightly. She looked up in shock. Celeste was embracing her… after a moment of shock, Alex brought her own arms up and hugged back, closing her eyes and letting out a deep sigh. Knowing Celeste, this didn't mean all was forgiven… but it was a sign that not all the bridges had been burned. Over Celeste's shoulder, Alex could see the woman who'd opened the door watching all of this, bemused.

After a long moment, Celeste stepped back, still holding her by the arms, "I'm so glad you're back, Alex… so glad you've returned to us alive…"

Alex half sighed, her eyes welling up slightly at the older woman's kindness, "Celeste… I'm…"

"Stop it. I'm not saying all is automatically forgiven you know... but I'm just so grateful you're here…" Celeste gestured, "Come on, let's go sit down. We were just getting ready to eat breakfast, and you know I always make too much."

"All right…" her eyes flicked up to the young woman again, and Celeste followed them, seeming to have forgotten she was even there.

"Oh, I have completely forgotten my manners. Alex this is my granddaughter, Piper Chapman. She came over from Boston after Daniel died to help me around the place."

Alex gave her usual half smile to Piper (who she was sure had been looking at her with something like fascination)… she recalled the name vaguely. Celeste didn't talk much about her family back East, leastways not with anyone but Big Dan. It was a sore spot for both of them, she knew. Something about a son who was a waste of skin and the woman he'd married who didn't have the sense God gave a horned toad. Alex was aware they had children but she knew little else.

Looking at Piper as the girl stepped forward to shake her proffered hand, Alex knew that the story was at least half bullshit. Maybe she'd come out here to help Celeste, but there was something about the way Celeste had said it and the way the girl's eyes had shot away for just the slightest moment that said there was more to it than that. Boston high society girls who looked like Piper and were around her age were going to debutante balls and trying to find a husband. They didn't come out to the untamed West just to help old granny… not unless they were escaping something.

Alex had always been good at reading people, getting below the surface, knowing what made them tick. She'd seen women like Piper out here before, mostly in the larger towns, and they rarely lasted long, never really had the strength to get past the initial shock of what things were really like. And even if they did, something about the West seemed to diminish them somehow. But there was something about Piper Chapman that was different… a sort of strength to her… an air of mystery that the girl probably didn't even know she was giving off… Just one look at her told Alex that Piper was a puzzle, that figuring her out might be a challenge. And Alex Vause could never resist a challenge…

A/N- From what Google translate tells me, ubiytsa means "killer" in Russian. I am not a language person, so sorry if I'm using it wrong... :)