Story Info
Title: String Theory
Rating: T [ Language, Adult Themes, Possible Violence Typical of Canon ]
Disclaimer: I do not own iZombie, I am not associated with anyone involved in the production of the show, and I receive no material compensation for writing this story.
Full Summary: Homicide detective Caroline Abruzzo's comfort zone is her work, her dog, and her caffeine addiction. That comfort zone is quickly shattered when her partner decides to start working with a tiny M.E. with pale skin and a penchant for knowing the unknowable about murder victims. As Caroline's social circle begins to shift, so do her feelings for M.E. #2-but opening up to people has never worked out well for her in the past.
Which will win out? Her fear? Her affection? Or the left-field, third-party zombie epidemic? Only time will tell.
Main Characters: Caroline Abruzzo (OC), Ravi Chakrabarti, Clive Babineax, Liv Moore
Main Ships: Caroline/Ravi (Ravoline), canons ships, possible peripheral Blaine/OFC
Other Story Stuff: Mostly follows canon (I say now but it never fuckin ends up that way does it); canon Autistic characters; Clive and Caroline are brotp af; possible spin-off for Blaine/OC
Trigger Warnings: Mentions of past ableist medical abuse (in the form of DBT); Mentions of past sexual assault. These are all I can think of right now but I'll add to as necessary and will add trigger warnings on any chapter that merits it. If you have an uncommon trigger, feel free to message me about it here or on any of the accounts listed on my profile, and I can tell you if/when it occurs.
Other Notes: s/o to all my friends on tumblr who encouraged me to write this, and s/o in particular to Ava Elizabethbemet who made the goregous cover for this story. She has her own iZombie fic called Folie a Deux under the name Mars Carter on here, and I really recommend checking it out.
Lastly, if you have a moment, I'd really love it if you could leave a review!
Chapter One
Nothing Else I Can Say
"From the beginning, I was wishing that our first impressions wouldn't last."
-Coming Around/Brie Larson
10:22 AM.
"You're never gonna believe what the ME told me."
Despite looking intensely focused, Caroline instantly breaks her concentration on the screen in front of her and swivels her chair to face her partner, looking up at him with a raised brow. Anyone who doesn't know her would take it as a sign of disinterest and annoyance.
Clive Babineaux is one of the few people that does know her, and so he continues.
"So I go down there," he says, pulling out the chair in front of his own desk. "And I ask if they have an ID on the Jane Doe we been working." He sits down. "Now, Doc says he's got nothing, but then his resident-this tiny albino looking girl-starts spouting all this stuff about Jane being arrested in Vancouver in 2008."
Both of Caroline's eyebrows raise instinctively at the mention of her hometown, but she shakes it off and nods. Keep going. Mindlessly, she picks up her legs to rest her ankles on the edge of Clive's desk. Their sargeant hates her doing this, but he isn't around just then.
Clive had hated it too, at first. He still didn't like it-even now, he shot an annoyed glance at her boots-but he's long since accepted that there's no stopping her.
"I ask her how she knows it, she goes 'Oh, it was just a hunch.'"
Caroline scoffs at this.
"Yeah, right? But they look it up, lo and behold: our girl's name was Stefani Germanotta. Picture of her in the report, fingerprints match, it all lines up."
"Okay. Weird, but not unbelievable." The thing Caroline likes about Clive is that he never asks for more than she can give him. Caroline can hold a normal conversation if she has to, but forcing herself to communicate primarily via words when her brain isn't in the mood is like trying to force an old clock to run. Stubborn wheels and gears that she has to constantly reset, only for it to burn out again minutes later. Rinse and repeat.
Not only does Clive know how to read between the lines so she doesn't have to do that, he also doesn't do that annoying thing where he makes a big deal when she does talk. Because nothing makes her want to be more social like people cooing over her like a toddler when she does.
"I'm getting to that," Clive says. "So I ask her how she knew that-I say, tell me the truth-and you know what she says?"
Caroline raises a brow.
"She says she's psychic."
Caroline snorts. "She said that?"
"Well, actually Chakrabarti said it, and then she said 'ish.' She's 'psychic-ish.'"
"'Psychic-ish.'" Caroline scoffs, shaking her head. "What does that even mean?"
"I don't know," Clive says, standing up. "But her information checks out. I'm gonna go tell Suzuki."
Caroline nods. "Let me know where it takes us," she calls after him.
He waves a hand in response.
12:16 PM.
Here is a math problem:
Q. Caroline hates the coffee at the station. However, she also cannot function without a blood-caffeine concentration of .11. If Starbuck's Blonde Roast is 16 fl oz and contains 360mg of caffeine, and Caroline is 5'9" and 160 lbs, how often does Caroline need to leave the station to buy coffee in order to keep her BCC at .11 or higher?
A. Enough times that she can't really be angry when she misses everything, and has no idea why, when she walks back in, her fellow officers are singing Lady Gaga loudly.
She shoots them an annoyed glance and heads to her desk. Clive is sitting at his, rubbing a hand down his face. He's clearly already having a shitty day, so she keeps her ankles off his desk this time, handing him his coffee instead. He takes it without speaking or even looking at her.
"I feel like I missed something," she says.
Clive is staring intently at his computer screen, and she thinks maybe he's just staring intently at the nearest stare-able spot that isn't her.
"You know Stefani Germanotta?"
"Sure."
"It's Lady Gaga's real name."
She takes a moment to process this.
"So Lady Gaga isn't her real name?"
Clive glares at her. She smirks a tiny bit, the left corner of her mouth turning up almost imperceptibly.
"It's not funny."
Caroline holds up her hands in surrender. "It's not funny," she agrees, and smirks more.
He glares more, then shakes his head and stands up. "Et tu, Abruzzo?"
She shrugs.
"Right in the back." He makes a stabbing motion before walking away. "Right in the back."
11:11 PM.
(Approx. ten hours after the Lady Gaga Incident stopped being funny.)
Caroline stomps into the ME's office. This is not easy to achieve; the floors are very solid, and her boots are not particularly heavy, but she is strong, and motivated.
Dr. Chakrabarti is still there, luckily. Unluckily, there seems to be no one else around, tiny and pale or otherwise. The man himself isn't in the morgue proper, but she can see him in the lab through the glass window, doing science or whatever. This is also unlucky, because it is probably the reason that he had apparently not heard her stomping.
She kicks the wall pointedly. "Hey!"
The good doctor looks up abruptly and sets down whatever he had been working on. He steps back into the morgue.
"Detective Abruzzo, what can I do for you?"
Caroline knows the senior ME in the same way she knows the guy at Starbucks whose shift aligns with her morning break. All-business. She tries to be polite-usually, anyway-but she's not really interested in bonding. Just interested in not having her coffee spit in. Or her evidence spit in, metaphorically speaking.
Caroline doesn't answer his question.
"So where's you little 'psychic' friend?" Caroline demands, descending the stairs into the morgue. She isn't literally doing air quotes around the word "psychic," but she's doing them with her voice.
It seems to take Ravi a second to register this; he squints at her in confusion for a split second before lighting up in realization. "Oh! Liv. The psychic. Yes. I, ah, sent her home early." Pause. "Why? What did she do?" His conversational tone has been switched out for a lower one, suspicious and worried.
"She identified our Jane Doe as a beloved American cultural icon."
"...I'm sorry?"
"Stefani Germanotta is Lady Gaga's real name."
"O-oh. Well, that's a wrench in the works, then."
"It is. It really is, especially since I can't concentrate now because every detective in the Goddamn precinct can't stop serenading my partner with really shitty acapella versions of 'Untouched.'"
"Well, that sounds more like an intradepartmental-wait, why would they be singing Untouched?"
"Cause...Lady Gaga."
"That's not a Lady Gaga song. I'm not even sure it's a song-wait, no, I remember that one now. The Veronicas. I haven't heard from them in awhile, I wonder what happened to them?"
"Wait. Okay, so what's the song that's like…'rah rah...ah ah ah?'"
(It should be pointed out that Ravi is, at this moment, and against his better judgment, severely tempted to pretend not to recognize the song and try to get her to sing it instead of saying the words. His better judgment wins out, however.)
"Bad Romance. The song is Bad Romance, how do you not know this?"
"Oh My God! Not the point!"
Ravi holds up his hands in surrender.
"All I'm saying is that I hold you, personally, responsible for this. So if I have to hear that Goddamn Lady Gaga song one more time, you and I are gonna have a problem."
"...I'm sorry, was I just threatened by an officer of the law? Like, just so we're clear on what just happened...?" The doctor doesn't sound angry, but he doesn't sound scared, either. Just sort of genuinely stunned.
Caroline doesn't really have an answer for that, so she goes with the simple, but classic, "Bite me." Then she turns and walked away. She doesn't put as much energy into stomping this time; her work here is done, whatever that work had been, and she mostly just wants to go home, get into bed, and hope to God she doesn't dream about Lady fucking Gaga.
a/n: It's important to me that you all know that Caroline does not reflect my views on Lady Gaga. We have very different opinions on that subject. Like how rad is Cheek to Cheek? I'm in love.