Chapter Text
The alarm. Monday. Six AM. A shrill, insistent siren cutting through the thick, stagnant air of his apartment. It had been ringing for what felt like an eternity, a relentless mockery of the silence he had desperately sought and was now all around him like a lead blanket.
Forty-eight hours.
Two days.
One endless, suffocating weekend.
The pizzas, cold, still sat on the dining table, a monument to a hunger that had vanished, replaced by a hollow ache. He hadn't touched them. Hadn't touched much of anything, really. Just the duvet, the pillow, the rough cotton sheets that had become a second skin.
His gaze had been fixed. Up. At the ceiling. A canvas for the shadows of the street, dancing, shifting, mocking. The restless branches of the plane tree outside, mimicking the frantic, pointless thoughts that had refused to cease their brutal ballet in his head.
Morgane. Her face. The way her eyes crinkled when she laughed, the defiant tilt of her chin, the chaotic explosion of her hair. And Morgane – silhouetted against the grey window of the DIPJ, perched precariously on her ledge, the instant he had spun that clumsy lie about the rental. She had known. He saw it, a fleeting, profound sadness bloom in her usually blazing eyes, a quiet understanding that had pierced him even then, a truth he had brutally, deliberately, shoved aside. Now, he tried to rip it out, to scour it clean from the inside of his eyelids, to tear it from the very fabric of his memory, but it clung, a burning brand. Etched there, indelible. A permanent scar on the slate of his despair.
Léo. That smile. So innocent. So pure. A mirror of her, but untainted by the storm that raged between them. A storm he had unleashed. A lie. A coward's retreat. The words of Céline, Roxane's prophetic warnings – they spun, a dizzying vortex, pulling him deeper into the abyss of his own making. Grosse connerie. His own. And the thought of Léo, the memory of that soft, warm belly, the irresistible urge to tickle it until he giggled – a sharp, physical pang in his chest. A phantom limb of joy, severed. He could almost feel the warmth of the small body against his, the soft skin under his fingertips, and the absence was a crushing weight.
He wanted to cry. God, he wanted to shatter, to let the tears come, a cleansing flood. But there was nothing left. The well was dry, the energy drained, siphoned off the moment she walked out, leaving behind only the echo of his lie. He was an empty vessel, hollowed out by regret, too exhausted even for the release of tears. A husk.
The alarm. Still ringing. A persistent, metallic scream.
It was the only thing that could pierce the stupor. The only thing that demanded a response. He didn't want to move. Every muscle ached with the weight of inertia, of grief, of shame.
But then, a flicker. A tiny, desperate spark in the vast darkness.
Her.
The possibility of seeing her at the DIPJ. Of standing before her, a broken man, and finding the words. The truth. The explanation. The desperate, foolish hope that it wasn't too late. That they hadn't crossed the point of no return.
That fragile, improbable hope was the only thing that pulled him from the bed. The only force strong enough to break the spell of the ceiling, the shadows, the self-inflicted torment. The only reason to face the Monday morning light. To go to work. To face the chaos that was Morgane Alvaro, and the even greater chaos that was his life without her.
~~~
The drive. A blur of grey asphalt, indifferent streetlights, the distant hum of the city waking. Each turn of the wheel felt like a betrayal, taking him further from the sterile void he had craved, closer to the inescapable reality of the DIPJ. His chest was tight, a vise gripping his ribs, each breath a shallow, painful gasp. He was a man walking towards his own execution, driven by a desperate, foolish hope.
The glass doors of the DIPJ. Cold, reflective. He saw his own reflection, gaunt, eyes shadowed, a stranger staring back. He pushed through, the familiar scent of stale coffee and disinfectant doing little to ground him. His gaze swept the open-plan office, a frantic, almost prayer-like search.
Empty. Her ledge. A stark, accusing void.
Too early. It was too early. She was always late. Always. A comforting, infuriating constant in his life. He clung to the thought, a flimsy raft against the rising tide of dread. The clock on the wall mocked him, its hands crawling with agonizing slowness. Eight forty five. She wouldn't be here. Not yet.
But then, a flicker in his peripheral vision. Céline. Already in her office. Her door ajar, a sliver of light escaping. She met his gaze through the window, her expression unreadable, then gave a curt nod, a silent summons. His stomach dropped. Céline. Early. And waiting for him. Nothing about this was right.
He walked, each step heavy, towards her office. The air grew thick, suffocating. He pushed the door open, the soft click echoing in the sudden quiet. Céline sat behind her desk, hands clasped, a severity in her posture that spoke of grim news.
"Adam." Her voice was low, devoid of its usual sharpness, which only made it more unsettling. "As section chief, there's something you need to know."
His heart hammered against his ribs. He knew. He didn't know, but he knew. A cold dread snaked its way through his veins, chilling him to the bone.
"I called Morgane this morning." The words hung in the air, heavy, final. "Her contract. It's terminated."
The world tilted. The floor beneath him seemed to sway. Terminated. The word echoed, a death knell. Not just from his personal life, the chaos, the laughter, the infuriating brilliance. But from his professional life too. The only place where their intertwined brains, like a Rubik's cube, truly made sense. The only place where their collaboration was inescapable. He felt a physical tearing, a limb being ripped from his very being. The thought of the silence, the utter, deafening silence of a DIPJ without Morgane, was a fresh wave of nausea.
And Morgane. Her pain. His betrayal, still fresh, a festering wound. Her father, the ghost that haunted her, the ambivalent, tangled knot of love and resentment. And now this. Losing the one place, perhaps, where she felt truly seen, truly useful, truly herself. It was too much. Too much for one person. His gut twisted with a fierce, protective instinct. He wanted to shield her, to absorb the blows, to somehow make it right.
"Why?" The word was a raw rasp, barely audible. "Why now? What happened?"
Céline sighed, a weary sound. "Adam, her temporary contract was never meant to be renewed these many times. It's… an anomaly. The administration has been pushing for this. I've tried everything. Every loophole, every argument. There's no obvious solution." Her gaze was steady, regretful.
"There has to be a solution," he insisted, his voice rising, a desperate plea. "She's indispensable. The stats prove it. We're better together than apart, you know that!"
Céline's expression softened, an almost tender look. "There is one option. But Adam, Morgane… she won't like it." She paused, letting the silence stretch, building the tension. "She has to join the police formally. Go through the academy. Become a real cop."
The words hung in the air, absurd, impossible. Morgane. A cop. The thought was so utterly antithetical to everything she was, everything she stood for. A cage for a wild bird. He was still processing the impossible demand, the sheer audacity of it, when the door to Céline's office swung open.
Gilles. His face pale, eyes wide with a different kind of urgency.
"Commissaire! Adam! They just found a body. Woman. In her forties… Red hair."
The words hit them like a physical blow. The air in the room crackled with an unspoken terror. Karadec's eyes locked with Céline's. Panic. Raw, unadulterated panic. A shared, horrifying realization blooming between them.
Red hair.