Alexis Fairchild walks up to the training dummy in her bedroom on the second floor of her Black Bottom townhouse, several wooden extensions from the thick padded wooden pole. She positions herself in a combat ready stance, feet shoulder length apart, and starts to connect with slow palm strikes against the extensions, but then begins to pick up pace. She then adds in blocks to the strikes... strike, strike, block, strike, block, block, strike... continuing on, mixing up the pattern of blocks and strikes, adding in strikes and blocks with her legs, knees and feet. As her body keeps up the strikes and blocks, her mind's eye turns inward.

Alexis is standing in a dark place with a column of light forming a circle of light around her, a light mist obscuring her feet, wearing what she is wearing as she trains; a white tank top and a pair of black yoga pants. Ahead of her, standing to either side of her and illuminated by similar columns of light, stands two versions of herself. One figure is a long haired, almost innocent looking version of herself to her right, looking as she did when she first arrived in Dead End, Michigan. The other figure was a version of herself with shorter hair similar to her current style, but parted to the left instead of the right, decked into the ceremonial blood red midriff topped outfit she wore when she was a Fang, a second-in-command of the Black Mamba criminal organization, who controlled a majority of the Red Light District in Dead End.

Alexis growls out to both images, "Shut up, both of you."

In the real world, Alexis continues her strikes and blocks at a furious pace, softly growling out to nobody in particular, "Shut up, both of you."

The image of current Alexis says, pointing to each in turn and announces, "I'm not you, Lexi... and I'm not you, Allie."

Fury surged in Theresa as she raises her left hand and backhands Teen Alexis across her left cheek. Out of pure reflex, Teen Alexis rears back her right hand, lets out a primal scream of rage, and throws a flat palm strike hard against her mother's jaw, which causes Theresa to let go of Teen Alexis's wrist, but Theresa's high heels slip on the tiled kitchen floor, causing her to fall backwards, the woman's skull connecting hard against the marble kitchen island countertop, crimson liquid flying into the air from the wound on the back of her head.

Alexis strikes harder and harder against the training dummy, foregoing any block maneuvers, softly uttering, "No... stop... you can't... stop!", followed up a few seconds later by a high palm strike near the top of the padded dummy's core, the impact so strong that it tips the dummy backwards to come crashing to the ground, as she lets out a primal scream of rage as she connects with the powerful strike.

Alexis stands there for a few seconds, her whole body shaking, tears sliding down her cheeks, mixing with the sweat from the workout. In her apartment and her own mind, she drops to her knees, sobbing, arms hanging down to her sides, the same words coming out of her lips both outside in the real world and inside her mind:

"I'm sorry, Mom... I'm so sorry."
"I'm sorry, Mom... I'm so sorry."