Night, April 11th, 1879. Blackthorn, Texas. Good Friday.

Later, when they told the tale, they said it went like this: that the Ranger rode into Blackthorn on a speckled grullo barely darker than her duster, bloodied but straight in the saddle, a blanket-wrapped little girl curled tight to the Ranger's body and a small boy clinging behind.

There'd been an attempted massacre, she'd said, and given the girl into the arms of the priest with a quiet word that turned him pale and sent him hurrying to do his best. The Injuns had taken to crucifyin' folk.

It was the boy who told them how Ranger Hawkins had touched his wrists and kissed away the pain, and showed them the almost-healed scars.

'She done made it better,' he said, and Ranger Hawkins smiled despite the blood matting the dark gold hair that escaped her white hat, and told the people that God weren't none too happy with the forces that beset them, and He had sent His angels and a power to her hand to help them. She told them how to hold off the Injuns who were rendered immortal by magic, and how she'd seen off a demon, and passed the tooth of a cougar to the grieving parents of a little girl slain by the darkness about the town, saying it was from one of the Dust Adders that had brought the wounded in behind her, brought to heel by Ranger Hawkins in Blackthorn's time of need. The man Murphy confirmed this, that they worked together on the Indians' hill, and that the Ranger could tame monsters.

And the people, seeing that she could work miracles and might yet deliver them from their enemies, would praise her, but Ranger Hawkins said: 'This power I show is the LORD's: y'all turn your attentions unto Him, for it is His hand that will save you. As for the rest, I'm jes' doing my job.'

Then the ranger stood watch over the people of the town throughout that harrowing night. Shooting, explosions, and shouting. Jericho Cantrell taking shots at one of the immortal Indians just outside city hall. Gus Shaw gathering the Dust Adders together to attack Evans, who he claimed was off to the ranch to slaughter cattle because he'd gone mad. The explosion that destroyed the church, and the Dust Adder pulling the body of Gus Shaw back to the hall, saying he'd been taken down.

It was a wild few hours. But now it has calmed down. Evans and his deputies has left town, as far as anyone could tell. The Dust adders hadn't liked it, but Wildcat and Cantrell had managed to convince them that they were needed to protect the people, not chase after the Marshal.

That was when the people started looking to her. They wanted her to find the rogue and stop him. Murphy's wife had come over to her, and begged her to find out what had happened to her husband, who had gone off with Carl to discover where the rest of the Comanche Band was up to and had not returned.

She was a hero to these people now. And they wanted her to hero on just a little more...

Wildcat looked around.  She'd lost her hat.

Her hat, once white and pristine, was now marked by a single bullet hole and rimmed with the Texas dust, soaked in sweat, and a spatter of dried blood was seen here and there.  The band was losing its smoothness and stitching as the hat had been used as a makeshift bucket to contain a small fire just hours before.  Although it did hold water (after a fashion, the bullet hole causing a leak), hats weren't really meant to be used so... forcefully.

The irony that the hat, much like her, was no longer as white and pristine as it once was never dawned on her.  That scar on her arm was never going away.  But at least the hat, like Katrina herself, was still white and pure somewhere in the depths of its weave even if the edges were a little frayed. And burned.  And bloody.

She found it, right there under the coach gun.  She'd set it there in case she had to defend the point, but she'd been wielding the .44-40 most of the night.  Its range, power and capacity were what the job needed.

Grabbing both, she turned to man who she suspected, at one point, also had some white in the weave of his soul, but it had long since been tarnished to at least a medium gray.

"Kingsnake."  She placed the tortured cranial decor upon her matted hair.  She'd tied it back for this with a piece of scrap baling wire she'd found in the bottom of the war bag.  If her momma could see her now, she'd have feinted.

"Ah reckon this here mess is good'r'n et's ev'r gunna get.  Ah reckon too th' woman a' tellin' me 'bout the mess out thar might'n be a widder right 'bout now, only fair ah go find out fer her."

The blue eyes narrowed.  A mere few days ago that stare was pathetic in its attempts to be fierce, but now, there was something behind it that at least gave one pause.

"Ah don' like ya'll Cantrell.  Ah really don'.  But ah got me no other 'tern'tive than ta go by what ah done seen ya do, an' ya ain't done wrong jus' yet.  So ah'm gonna trust ya.  Ya may be a snake that's good fer killin' th' other snakes, but yer a snake all th' same."

Jericho nods. "Fair enough. I've done tried my best, anyhow. You want me ridin' with you, all you gotta do is say the word."

"Ah think ah gots to do this one by mah lonesome.  One riot, one Ranger.  'Sides ah need mah Kingsnake here ta' keep th' others in line."

Cantrell nods. "I see. Well, then. I wish you the best, and I'll keep the snake here in line 'till you get back." He tips his hat to her. "God go with you, Hawkins. I reckon you're Daddy'd be proud, and I know Armstong would be, if he could see you now."

"Th' Lord goes to th's strangest places Cantrell.  Mah daddy may be why ah done got 'n this mess... but he ain't why ah stayed in it.  Hold down th' fort, ah need to fill mah canteen 'fore ah go."

She had a feeling she'd need some water to bless, so she'd better take a good long drink too.