There is a light that never goes out

'Take me out tonight

Where there's music and there's people

And they're young and alive...'

.

Sometimes when she stood at the window she imagined she could feel him there. Eyes narrow and icy blue. Chin proud and determined. Pouty mouth.

'Gene?' she whispered.

He wasn't there of course. It had been a while since she left him standing in the freezing night and walked away.

'You're a long time dead' echoed round her head sarcastically. If only she'd known then what she knew now how she would have begged and pleaded with him to let her stay in his strange half arsed world where in retrospect she realised she had felt free and alive and fabulous, like a siren, a temptress, a desirable mysterious creature that she had never been in the real world. Gene had made her feel that way. He had made her feel so many things she had never felt before and she missed him so badly.

She regretted so much about the way she had been in those last days. All the pain he had been in and she had bulldozed through those feelings, not thinking, not standing back and thinking things through calmly and carefully. Letting Keats manipulate her, use her as a weapon against him. To think she had imagined herself to be intelligent.

She whispered his name again. 'Gene'

'It doesn't matter how many times you say his name, he won't hear you.' Keats said gently. 'You made your choice Alex.'

She nodded but didn't look at Keats, she could never look at him, he was too ugly, too terrible, too evil, too triumphant.

All the promises that she would see Molly again had been a lie, a glamour. She had seen a child, but she wasn't Molly. She looked like Molly but she didn't feel or smell or sound like her. She was a husk of a child who had been wheeled in to placate Alex and she had shown her true dead self after a short while. The real Molly wasn't dead, she was warm and alive in the other world where Alex had lived so long ago she could barely remember anything about it nowadays.

'Let me go- please' she implored Keats. She could feel him standing behind her, his warm rancid breath on her neck. The scent of death was heavy and claustrophobic.

'Where are you hoping to go to?' Keats asked, amused.

'Let me go back to him.' Her voice was barely audible.

Keats roared with laughter, 'He didn't want you Alex. He saw you as a threat, don't you remember? He couldn't wait to get rid of you.'

'He was saving me- being selfless.' Alex protested.

'Keep telling yourself that.' Keats said. 'Get ready for dinner- put the black dress on. I've people to impress tonight.'

Alex wondered what would happen if she stayed in her room. She was frightened of Keats but she didn't know why. The worst that could happen had already happened hadn't it?

.

Take me anywhere, I don't care

I don't care, I don't care

And in the darkened underpass

I thought Oh God my chance has come at last

But then a strange fear gripped me

And I just couldn't ask...

.

'Guv?'

Gene pretended not to hear the whiny voice. Lewis Beaufort. DI Lewis Beaufort. What a fucking poncey name.

'Guv?'

Gene turned around and glared at Beaufort but as usual his DI remained completely oblivious to the death ray stare.

'What?'

'Someone to see you, I took him to the interview room.' Beaufort said.

Gene sighed deeply; at least the kid was learning, he had learned for instance, not to bring just anyone to Gene's office, even though Gene had to rough him up a bit to get the message through. He followed Beaufort to the interview room, his curiosity piqued, he wasn't expecting anyone.

His visitor was Evan White. Gene's bottom lip crept over his top one momentarily as he tried to battle his feelings of discomfort.

'What do you want?' he grunted.

Evan moved forward and held out his hand, 'DCI Hunt, it's been a long time.'

'Not long enough.' Gene forced a grimace and ignored Evan's hand.

Evan shrugged, 'I'll try not to take up too much of your valuable time. It's just….. well, I saw someone you used to know the other day…..someone we both knew actually.. obviously. Alex Drake.'

Gene tried to keep his expression impassive, 'Really?'

'I heard she was dead.' Evan said, 'Yet I'm sure I saw her.'

'Where?' Gene asked, wishing his heart would stop blundering about in his chest.

'Holbourn.' Evan replied crisply. 'I'm sure it was her, she saw me but didn't speak, she looked straight through me, it was the oddest feeling, like seeing a ghost. I called after her but she disappeared into a building, and that was another odd thing, when I got to the door of the building it was all locked up, like the place was deserted, like no-one had been there for a very long time.'

'You were mistaken.' Gene told him, 'She's dead. You saw a woman who looked like her.'

Evan didn't seem convinced, 'So how did she die?'

'She got shot in a jewel heist.' Gene lied. 'It was a blood bath, we were stitched right up. She wasn't the only officer I lost that day.'

'Hmm.' Evan stared at him long and hard.

Gene puffed himself up and stared back, 'Was there anything else?' he asked.

'Was there an inquest?' Evan asked.

Gene nodded, 'Oh yes.'

'Have you a copy of the coroner's report handy by any chance?' Evan asked in his infuriatingly snotty manner.

'Funnily enough I haven't.' Gene said sarkily, patting himself down, 'But I'm sure if you poke about a bit you'll come across one. Feel free to ask at the front desk.'

Evan gave him a look that would have curdled milk before flouncing out of the room.

'Tosser.' Gene said under his breath, he grabbed a pack of cigarettes from his inside pocket and lit one, resting his bum on the edge of the table as he smoked and thought. He knew that he was supposed to have forgotten all about Alex but he hadn't and it didn't seem like he was ever going to. Which was putting a bit of a spanner in the works. His world was all about moving on but this time it just wasn't happening, the moving on thing had come to a grinding halt because he loved the stupid bint and couldn't stop thinking about her.

Back in CID he gazed out of the window into the dark winter's afternoon.

'Bolly.' He said softly, testing out a name he hadn't used in months, almost a year.

'Gene?' came the answer.

His mouth went dry. It really sounded like her- not just his wishful thinking. 'Bolly?' he said more loudly.

There was no answer, so it had been his imagination after all. His face set hard again as he agonised over his newfound information. Why had he assumed that Keats had sent her through to god knows what?

Gene was incredibly shaken up by the fact that Alex hadn't moved on and that she was still out there somewhere in the city. He turned from the window and looked into the smoky incident room, his eye catching on the whiteboard. Her whiteboard. He sniffed and his mouth quivered as he remembered how often he'd taken the piss out of Alex and her whiteboard.

He left his office and walked through his new team. Several pairs of eyes followed him as he crossed the carpet tiles with long legged strides until he reached the whiteboard.

'OK rabble, listen up' he said, and was quite impressed that they all paid attention immediately. He took the pen and wrote on the board. Then he turned back to the room, 'We have a missing person who needs to be found asap.' he announced. 'She's been sighted in Holbourn but she could be anywhere in the city.' he tapped the board, ' this is a description of Alex Drake- DI Alex Drake. As I said, I want her found.'

a/n –

this was going to be a one-shot but I think it may have turned into a two-shot xx