Chapter One: You Have Been Selected
Myka Bering stood behind her desk, as she had been for over forty minutes. Not speaking, not moving, just staring for a while at the box that was filled with the things she would take back to her apartment.
Her eyes flitted downward to the objects she still grasped tightly. In one hand, her nine millimeter service pistol, the other, her gold detectives shield.
With her eyes squeezed shut and a deep breath, she set her badge down. Keeping her eyes closed, she let her muscle memory work, disassembling her weapon. Her compulsive tendencies dictated that she open her eyes to place the parts of her gun on the desk in a specific order.
Keeping her head held high, she grabbed her box of personal effects and walked through the bull pen. Part of her wished the other officers would wait until she was gone to begin whispering about her. Her rational side knew it wouldn't really make a difference, they had been talking about her for months, a lot longer than the investigation that just ended, and they would continue to talk after she walked out the door.
"Suspended indefinitely" was just another way to say Myka was fired, skipping the messy union lawyer business. She deserved as much, after all her partner, the rising star of the department, had been killed.
The call came in at three am for Myka and Sam to respond to a disturbance. Normally that was for the beat cops to handle, but it was tied to a case they had been working on and no other units were available.
Myka had been asleep when her phone rang, she was groggy as the dispatcher gave her the details, she stumbled as she pulled on clothes. It took her maybe two minutes longer than usual, an amount of time inconsequential, and easily made up for when Myka flipped the siren of her car on and floored the gas pedal.
Detective Bering arrived at the abandoned Warehouse ten minutes after the call came in. An impressive response time, but Sam Martino had still beaten her there, his own car already parked near the back alley.
Myka's service pistol was drawn as she moved through the building, its familiar weight giving her courage. All was quiet, and she was slowly beginning to believe it was a false alarm. That was when she saw him, lying still on the dirty cement floor.
Her heart pounded in her ears as she continued towards him, her arms swinging around, gun pointing every direction to cover the darkened building. But it was empty. Only her and her downed partner remained.
Weapon holstered, Detective Bering fell to her knees beside her partner's body. She didn't see the gunshot wound at first, his dark suit hiding it in the dim lighting. She touched him, feeling for a pulse, a breath, anything to indicate life. Her hands came away wet with his blood.
Sam was dead. Just like that. Her mentor and partner of three years was gone. Myka managed to compartmentalize her feelings and called it in.
She didn't allow herself to feel anything until after the coroner drove away with Sam's body and the backup she had called for had finished their sweep, turning up nothing, not evidence of any kind.
They refused to let Myka see the body. She snagged a coroner's report, it told her Sam died as a result of a single gunshot wound to the chest. It pierced his lungs. It took him five minutes to bleed out and die. Alone on the cold floor as the murderers got away.
Myka was sitting in the dark of her apartment, a glass of Jack in her hand. Her heart was finally allowed to feel the extent of her loss. Her partner, her best and only friend was dead. Capitan Dickenson wouldn't even allow Myka to be the one to inform Sam's wife. She was sent home after finishing her reports and handing them over to another detective.
She was removed from the case.
So she drank, trying to simultaneously mourn her loss and feel numb. That's when the internal affairs detectives knocked on her door and put her in cuffs. She didn't even have a chance to change, so the two detectives paraded her through the police station barefoot, wearing her pajamas and the silver bracelets that dug painfully into her wrists.
They ignored her questions as they demanded she answer theirs. Why had she arrived so long after her partner? Where had she been in the amount of time it had taken Detective Martino to die? Did she have an alibi? Why did her breath smell of alcohol? Did she have a drinking problem? What exactly was her personal relationship with Detective Martino?
This was the question that bothered Myka the most. For God's sake, it was 2120, and they still thought woman and men couldn't be professional, couldn't have platonic relationships. Myka was close friends with Sam's wife; even if she had been interested in Sam in that way, she could never hurt Allison like that.
They didn't believe her, but they allowed her to go home.
A month passed, the investigation on Myka and Sam's death was inconclusive. Myka seemed to be the only one present near the approximant time of death, but they didn't have the evidence to pin it on her. All they had was the firm belief that Detectives Bering and Martino had a romantic affair.
Detective Bering should have expected what was coming when Captain Dickenson called her into his office. She had thought, hoped perhaps, that the investigation into her was closed and she could stop being a desk jockey. Instead, Dickenson told her to pack up her things, leave her badge and gun, and leave with what little undamaged reputation she had left.
"And I suggest you leave town all together Det- Miss Bering." He huffed from behind his desk.
So Myka cleared her desk, leaving only her shield and gun, and kept her head high as she walked through a sea of accusatory whispers.
"I heard they were sleeping together…"
"She hired someone to kill him when he wouldn't leave his wife…"
"Are you kidding me? The bitch probably pulled the trigger herself…"
"How'd she get away with it?"
"Maybe she's in with the Manifestus…"
Myka let the gossip bounce off of her as she continued to her personal car. She sat there, in the parking lot, staring out the windshield, wondering what she was supposed to do now.
She didn't feel like returning to the empty apartment she could no longer afford. She didn't have any friends she could call, and she would die before she called her mother or sister. She could hear the I-told-you-sos now. Her father had been right all along, she couldn't make it as a homicide detective in Denver. Her mother would tell her she should have settled down with a nice boy already. Her sister would only remind her that she was the black sheep of the family.
What were you even supposed to do when you lost your job? And what about when you lost your friend? She still hadn't found a way to cope with that over the last four weeks. She didn't know what to do, but a bar seemed like a good place to start.
She hated the song playing when she arrived at the club on the other side of town. Her usual dive was a cop bar, and there was no way she could be seen in one now. She ignored the sound she could hardly call music as she sat on a stool and ordered her first shot of whiskey. It seemed the only music this place had was newer, upbeat, party music. It wasn't fitting her mood, and that annoyed her, so she took another shot.
She looked at the crowd surrounding her. Most of the patrons were her age or younger, but she still stuck out like a sore thumb in her pant suit. She removed her jacket, undid her top buttons, and that helped her blend a bit. Maybe, she thought, if she looked like she fit in with the happy crowd, she could pretend for a little while.
Myka grabbed a napkin, pulled a pen from the jacket she'd just removed and began writing, trying to come up with a plan. She lost count of how many shots she took and of how many napkins she crumpled and threw out, but the words were becoming more blurry than usual, so she gave up.
She spun around to face the crowd, watching the beautiful and young dance with reckless abandon. One more shot and she had enough courage to rise and join them. She didn't know the song, and dancing wasn't normally her strong suit, and she absolutely detested crowds, but right now she didn't care.
She lost herself in the sea of sweaty gyrating bodies letting go, at least temporarily, of everything beyond this moment. The flashing lights made everything surreal, the pounding beats driving her movements. She didn't care that strangers hands were running over her body, she returned the action to more than a few.
There was one girl in particular, the same age as Myka, perhaps a little younger, who caught her attention and held it firmly. Her eyes were a gold color that hand Myka wondering if it was genetics or enhancement. Her hair the auburn color that seemed too perfect to be natural, and Myka didn't really care at the moment if it was, because it felt soft as silk when she tangled her hands in it. Her mouth tasted like champagne, not Myka's favorite, but she knew she probably reeked of Jack Daniels.
Myka, who was usually the one in control of all her encounters, and had never before accepted a proposition from someone whose name she didn't know, found herself nodding when the woman asked if she would like to go back to her place- it was just around the corner, after all.
Myka would meet her at the back door after she settled her tab with the bartender. Myka left her intended one night stand on the dance floor as she wound her way back to the bar. She was breathing heavily when she reached it, and ended up in the seat she had abandoned a couple hours prior.
"Can I get a check?" Myka slurred when the bartender came her way once more.
It was busy, and only seemed to be getting busier as Myka put her head in her hands for a moment. She took a deep breath and looked up when the bartender pushed a drink under her nose. She stared at him, drunkenly confused, "I didn't order this."
"It's from down the bar." He waved vaguely before walking away.
Myka looked down at it, questioning. She was already so far in, she figured one more drink couldn't hurt. Besides, she was sobering up faster than she was okay with. She tilted the glass back, gulping down its icy contents.
Her nose wrinkled. She didn't think anyone in her part of the country still ordered White Russians, and the bartender had gone a little heavy on the vodka, it was almost over powering.
That's when Myka realized there was a pink sheet of paper stuck to the condensation in the bottom of the glass.
She plucked it off and held it between her hands, bringing it close to her face. The print was tiny, and there was a lot of it, as well as an official looking stamp embossed in the top right hand corner.
Ms. Myka Ophelia Bering,
You have been selected to serve your country.
That was as much as she was able to read before the room started spinning.
She tried to stand, but her legs were tangled in the legs of the stool and she fell heavily to the floor, her head hitting the scuffed floor first, making her see stars.
Two strong hands hoisted her up and began to drag her out of the club. She struggled, tried to protest, but she was quickly losing consciousness.
The last thing she saw was an older blonde woman frowning down at her, shaking her head in a disappointed gesture Myka recognized well.
While mentally cursing the absurdly strong man folding her into a waiting car, Myka didn't realize her kidnappers had actually saved her from her would be murderer. Sure, the woman would have made it look like a suicide, but no one would have read too much into it. Myka didn't have friends, no close family, the people in her apartment building didn't even know her name. Myka Bering was alone in a city filled with pissed off people she had made enemies with.
While she was sure she was about to die, Myka's life had actually been saved, for the time being that is.
AN: Future Chapters may be longer, but updating will not be as often as my others. If this is something you would like to see continued, leave a review, feedback is always welcome.