A/N: I love Debra Morgan. I think by s3 I was actively wishing the show would suddenly rebrand itself Debra, and by the time s5 rolled around I would've happily thrown Dexter through a meat grinder if it meant I could get more screen time for Deb (and let's not even talk about s7 and Hannah McKay; or, worse, fucking s8...). I loved her, and she deserved a thousand times better than being forever overshadowed and eventually consumed by Dexter's greed.

So this is me giving (or, at least, attempting to give) her the narrative for s1, to try to disentangle her from Dexter (and Brian Moser). Hope you like it half as much as I enjoyed working with her.

Fogged-Up Mirror
Setting: before "Dexter"

When I was 11 or 12— somewhere around there —I had a very specific image of myself, of who I wanted to be. Respected. Powerful. In control. People would shit their pants when I walked into the room. People would want to do things for me, to get on my good side. I would be some grand fucking poobah, a rockstar, and no one would ever step over me, or just... I don't know, just forget me.

I held onto that for a long time, somewhere not so deep down. I still do. And right now that grand fucking... whatever (Lieutenant? Captain? Fucking Commissioner?) is on the other side of the mirror, staring back at me. Nudity is the grand equalizer, and from here, dripping wet on the mat outside my shower, it'd be impossible to distinguish between Chief Go Fuck Yourself Morgan and Brandy (Brandi?) the cop cum whore.

But then I squish my contacts into my eyes, wander out into my bedroom and select my outfit off the top of two different piles on the back of my chair, smell check them as I step over to the dresser and look around. Cheap earrings? Check. Shitty, trashy rings? Check. Animal-print chiffon bra? Check, but ew. Then back into the bathroom to paint on the extra dark liner and that awful fucking sparkly eye shadow, the fake fake lashes and the red red lipstick that just scream, "Hey, wanna let me suck you off in the backseat of your station wagon?"

As I study myself in the mirror, already feeling the thong riding up my ass, I can't see that tough, Wall Street-esque bitch anymore. It's just me in there, looking small. And exposed. In more ways than one.

I exhale, look away. Grab a bracelet off the counter and slide it on. Take off one of the rings.

I've been with Vice almost two years now. I worked with the unit a couple times when I was in uniform, thought it seemed interesting and a little exciting, requested the transfer as it became clearer and clearer to me that there wouldn't be an opening in Homicide any time in the foreseeable future. And it was interesting. It was exciting. But more and more it's become a fucking endless rotation of street corners and old motels that the city has patently forgotten to condemn; whores, Johns, and other, sundry, doped-up shitheads. Condoms and crack pipes. I've barely surfaced from undercover work since last November. Sometimes I feel like I barely have contact with the rest of the department. Certainly, I'm not any closer to Homicide or, for that matter, to a silver shield.

And, besides which, having to paint myself up like a prostitute, having the world see me like this, having to see myself like this five days a week doesn't do shit for my self-esteem.

I head into the living room, shove all the shit on the couch off it or just to the side, then plop on top, adjusting my undies with a thumb. The second I'm still, images from yesterday pop back up, start playing in freeze frame across the back of my eyelids.

It was just around sunrise, and I was heading home. Three or four minutes after pulling out of the motel parking lot, I saw a line of patrol units along an undeveloped lot and a couple guys putting up tape, so I pulled in behind them, asked what was going on. They directed me in through a gap in the fence, to the knot of officers standing around the center of the field, so in I went, where I promptly saw what they were all looking at.

I've never seen anything like it. Never would've imagined anything like it. She was in pieces: a torso, her skin a bloodless, china-white against the grass; her breasts cut off, individually packaged in butcher paper, and replaced in the gashes where they'd been excised; her head resting, upside down, on her belly button, her hair cascading down her sides. Her legs and arms had been wrapped in more brown paper and were stacked like firewood underneath her body. Not a drop or a streak of blood. Each stump was clean. She looked fucking freeze-dried, or like something molded out of wax. The sight of her paralyzed my breath in my chest.

I stood there silently with the other officers for I don't know how long, unable to form a cogent thought. And then the fuckers from Homicide showed up and asked what I was doing there, and I was promptly kicked off the premises by Miami Metro's newest LT— Maria LaGuerta.

Goddamn, but she looked at me like I was a piece of dog shit.

I swallow and glance off the couch, spot Friday's cheek-hugging shorts on the ground, stab them with two fingertips and pull them toward me. Inside one of the pockets is a cigarette, which I pull out and stick between my teeth. On the coffee table is a lighter, and I sit up just enough to light up, then fall back, exhaling gratefully.

I wish I'd found an in. That case has primetime CNN mini-series written all over it. Hell, it has a fucking Showtime series written all over it. I wish I'd come up with something. Dazzled them with some fucking insight. It's aggravating me that as I was standing there I had fuck all to say, couldn't think of a single thing to leave an impression on them. On the rare occasion anyone does notice me around the water cooler, on the rare occasion I even get to be in the station anywhere near the water cooler, I'm Harry Morgan's Daughter. I know they wonder where my upward momentum is, if I have a teaspoon of his instincts. Even though my father spent his whole career in the box, other cops talk about him like he was a hero, and by their estimations I fall far, far short of the Morgan Legacy. My brother's at least some hotshot forensics guy, but me, I'm chickenshit in Vice, and it hurts more than I want to admit when a fellow officer suggests, even jokingly, that I'd probably have better luck climbing the ladder from my knees.

Slowly, I blow out a stream of smoke, look up at the ceiling as it dissipates, at the oscillating fan, spots of water damage seeping through the plaster.

And then there's that body. Dead, bloodless, and sectioned into pieces. I wonder who she was.

And I wonder about the sick fuck that murdered her. Chopped her up, wrapped her up, and left her displayed in that field.

Wonder who was meant to see it.

Wonder why. If there even could be a reason.

A muffled buzzing attracts my attention, and I glance away from the ceiling.

Phone. (Shit, what time is it?)

I search around the couch, the random clothes piled by my feet, then lean off to check the floor again, cigarette gripped between my teeth. Shifting a shirt aside, I uncover and grab the phone, then sit up to tap off some ash into an empty styrofoam cup.

"Morgan," I say, answering without checking the ID.

There's a brief, airless pause, then, "Hello, may I speak with Debra Morgan?"

I exhale smoke. "Speaking." I already know what this is.

"Hello. My name is Henry and I'm with—"

"Fuck off." I flip the phone shut, set it on the couch beside me. Take another drag. Then I remember my earlier thought, pick it up again, stick the cigarette back between my teeth as I lift the phone aloft and stare at the little digital screen.

7:36.

I've got some time before the briefing.

My gaze wanders to the TV as I let my hand fall. At least one of the local channels is bound to be running something on the body, and for whatever reason I want to know what everyone else knows. Maybe just to continue the fantasy that that is going to be my day, rather than it being a bunch of gross, sweaty, disgusting fuckwads measuring my flesh by the dollar.

I start digging around for the remote.