A/N: ARGH! I actually did get this written yesterday with the intention of updating one last time in 2012 but then I got side tracked and didn't get it edited in time to post it! Nevertheless I wish you all a very happy new year and I hope 2013 has started well for everyone! X

~xXx~

Chapter One

It wasn't the first time that Gene had given evidence in court by any stretch of the imagination but it was the most personal. It was also the most important. He felt his guts churning as he paced up and down outside the courtroom, hands in pockets, expression grim. He'd been to the toilet four times already. He'd also counted the floor tiles three times. Worryingly he came out with a different result every time.

"Gene."

He didn't usually allow nerves to get the better of him but this was one time that they were going nowhere. He couldn't shake them off. Even a crafty nip of scotch hadn't helped. In fact, half a bottle probably wouldn't have helped. Nothing was going to settle his nerves this time. Not when he knew what was coming.

"Gene."

The part that frustrated him the most was the fact that none of his team would be there to support him because every last one was going to be called as a witness and none were allowed in the courtroom until they'd had their turn in the stand. On the flipside it meant that he was going to be there to support everybody else, Alex included, but being the first one to give evidence was going to be a lonely and nerve-wracking option.

"Gene!"

Finally Gene stopped pacing and looked at Alex's slightly annoyed expression.

"What?" he cried.

"You've already working a hole in the floor," she told him, "why don't you try sitting down?"

"Because me legs have other ideas," Gene said as he completed his current lap. He put a hand to his stomach as he felt his insides flip-flop again. "Bugger, I wish nature would stop calling, it's gonna run up a huge bloody phone bill."

"Oh, not the toilet again," Alex sighed.

"Don't know why you're complaining!" Gene told her, "I've heard about the standard of yer female lavatorial facilities, at least you don't get bloody arse-sandpaper in there!"

Alex froze as a door opened and a serious-looking gentleman began to walk toward them.

"Gene," she said quietly, "I don't think you've got time for any more sandpapering."

Gene swallowed and felt his limbs turning slightly weak. His eyes closed momentarily and he took in a deep breath as he heard his name being called. After months of waiting the moment had arrived. This was it. Now or never.

"Right," he set his jaw into a firm, straight line and looked Alex in the eye. "Time to pick out wallpaper patterns for Jimbo's cell.

"Good luck, Gene," Alex whispered, sounding slightly tearful as she wrapped her arms around his neck for a moment.

"DCI Gene Hunt?"

Gene took one last, very deep breath before he turned around and nodded.

"I suppose me arse can wait five minutes," he mumbled.

~xXx~

Gene very carefully kept his eyes away from the smug face that he knew was staring at him. Throughout the time he was being sworn in he could feel that rotten gaze falling in his direction. It burned his skin like a magnifying glass catching the sun on a hot summer day. He focused instead on knowing that this might be the most important day's work he was ever going to do in his life. The future of so much rested on this; his station, his world, his team. He thought about what the bastard in the dock had put Alex through and he wanted to kill him, right there and then. There was also someone conspicuous by her absence; someone who Gene – despite his grumbles – knew didn't belong in Fenchurch West. Whatever she might have poached of his, be it his scotch or his missus, there was a niggling feeling in the back of his mind that Kim belonged in Fenchurch East.

"DCI Hunt," The lawyer for the prosecution began, "Could you please describe for the court the events that you witnessed in Fenchurch West police station on the morning in question?"

Gene swallowed and stared across the courtroom.

"I was visiting me esteemed colleagues at Fenchurch West," he said, a sarcastic note in his voice, "and making me way up from the basement when I heard the sound of screaming. A woman. Then I heard a," he let his eyes dart to Keats for a split second, "distinctive male voice," he continued, "making some vague threats of sex and violence." He grunted, "bit like his movie collection."

"DCI Hunt, please keep to the facts."

Gene scowled.

"If I must."

"What happened after you heard the screams and the threatening voice?"

Gene felt his blood boiling as he recalled the moments that followed.

"I ran down the corridor," he began, "followed the voice and turned the corner. That's when I saw 'im."

"Saw who?"

Gene turned fully to Keats this time, jamming his head in his direction.

"Him," he spat, "Detective Chief Inspector Jim Keats."

And what was Mister Keats doing?"

Gene flinched as he felt genuinely sick at the memory.

"He had a woman on the floor," he said flatly, "pinned her down. Parked his backside on her. Leaning over her."

"Did you recognise this woman?"

Gene nodded.

"Yes," he said, "it was his bloody DI." He spat the words out in Keats's direction, "Victoria Stone." He could hardly bring himself to carry on but somehow managed to tell the jury; "he asked her if she liked it rough."

"What do you think he meant by that?"

"I don't have to think, I know. He has a track record of introducing Little Jimbo into places he's not wanted"

"Can you be more specific?"

Gene didn't want to be, but he didn't have a choice.

"I strongly suspect," he hissed, "that DCI Keats was about to remove her lower garments and commit a serious sexual assault to add to the count of ABH that I'd just witnessed."

"What did you do?"

"What would anyone do? Grabbed him by the Armani suit and pulled him off the poor tart. Punched him. Held him long enough for DI Stone to make a quick getaway. No wonder she felt safer with a bloody drug baron than she did with her own superior."

"What happened next?"

Gene pulled a slight face.

"Might have introduced a knee to his knackers," he said, "possibly jammed a fist into his flabby guts."

"Objection!" A furious Keats cried out, "My guts are not flabby!"

"DCI Keats, you are not entitled to make objections," the judge warned him.

The lawyer decided to take back control of the situation.

"Following your skirmish with DCI Keats, what happened?"

Gene sighed.

"Security were looming. I decided to leave. I had charges to file," he turned to Keats with a steely stare, "didn't I, Jimbo?"

"DCI Hunt, please refrain from threatening the defendant?" the judge warned.

"That wasn't a threat," Gene mumbled but turned away regardless.

The lawyer looked on seriously.

"You have a long history with DCI Keats," he began, "is that right?"

Gene swallowed.

"Unfortunately, yes," he said, wrinkling his nose as though someone had just broken a few rotten eggs in the corner of the room.

"Can you tell us a little about your history with the defendant?"

Gene flexed his fingers and wrists as though he was about to sit down and play a haunting refrain on the piano then gripped the sides of the stand like a politician making a speech.

"With pleasure," he said.

"When did you fist meet DCI Keats?"

"Nineteen eighty three, as a member of D and C," Gene pulled himself as tall as he could, "supposed to be investigating practices within me department," he enunciated every word as though performing in a play, "Instead he poisoned me team against me and caused a crapload of damage to the premises," he scowled at Keats who smiled back politely, "including to a top of the range typewriter." He turned back to the lawyer. "Like a bad penny he turned up again in eighty five," he flinched momentarily remembering the brief, painful parting from Alex as Simon arrived the first time around before she made her way back from the pub, "Set me up. Bribed the new DI into leaving me a little white, powdery surprise. Then he set about filling the air with noxious substances to persuade me better half," he rolled his eyes, "that's DCI Drake, into letting Little Jimbo go for an afternoon outing. Luckily it didn't work."

"You are saying that DCI Keats drugged DCI Drake with the intention of having sexual intercourse with her?"

"Exactly what I'm saying," Gene nodded forcefully, "He topped off that exemplary behaviour by attacking a young DC called Susannah Kite." He felt sick as he recalled that day, "but luckily his… injuries from being hit by a car overcame him." Gene neglected to mention the disappearing gunshot wound to Keats's head. "Ended up being carted away under a black blanket." He took a deep breath. "We assumed the gentleman had passed away. Ten lovely quiet years, we had. Then he turned up again as the head of Fenchurch West CID. Began a campaign of nuisance against my officers. Little messages and tokens of his esteem. Things to try to make them leave me team."

"Was there a particular focus for this pattern of behaviour?" the lawyer asked.

"Funnily enough, there was," Gene sent a stony glare toward Keats, "DC Kimberley Stringer, as she was at the time. Bastard in the dock got himself obsessed with her. Wasn't just enough to persuade her to do his dirty work, he got her doing the dirty as well. Few pills here, bit of laughing gas there, poor girl didn't know where her head was."

"What was the nature of the relationship between DCI Keats and DC Stringer?"

"Does it count as a relationship when only one of them is aware they're in one?" Gene muttered. "DCI Keats used a number of unsavoury tactics to persuade Miss Stringer into entertaining his pink, floppy compatriot in the bedroom."

"And how can you be sure that the relationship was not reciprocated on DC Stringer's side?"

Gene sighed and looked somewhat awkward.

"Because," he began tightly, "Metal Mickey prefers munching on carpet to cock."

"DCI Hunt…"

Gene rolled his eyes.

"DC Stringer is a person of the homosexual persuasion," he said tightly.

"How did his relationship with DC Stringer come to light?"

"I think the giveaway," Gene began angrily, "was when he tied her up and left her to die in her own home. Luckily Shoebury… DCI Shoebury, had enough brains to go looking." He swallowed as he thought about the events that followed. "DCI Keats was not content with leaving her half-starved and dehydrated. He put a boot in her belly and half an hour after there was blood all over his shiny foyer floor. DC Stringer suffered a miscarriage." His eyes were firmly on Keats as he concluded, "the defendant killed his own offspring."

For the first time Keats seemed uncomfortable. His face twitched anxiously and he looked as though some kind of weird creature was about to burst forth from one eye.

"Was this the last encounter that DC Stringer had with DCI Keats?"

"Unfortunately not," Gene said angrily, "few weeks later he shot her in the neck. Poor sod almost didn't make it. Luckily she's tougher than she looks…" he thought about her myriad piercings and tattoos and changed his mind, "no, she's as tough as she looks. Which is why she survived. But DCI Keats went on to target more of my staff. Bribed them. Blackmailed them. Used anything he had over them. Lovely business practices, that one."

"Can you give us some example?"

Gene could give a shitload.

"Blackmailed DCI Shoebury into transferring to Fenchurch West," he began, "bribed the late DC Ashton into bringing unpleasant packages in the building. Others he targeted with varying degrees of success."

"And the early morning of the second of May," the lawyer continued, "can you describe for us the sequence of events that took place at Fenchurch East police station?"

Gene's blood ran cold. If there was one part he was dreading, this was it.

"I was watching the election coverage with my officers," he began stiffly, "walls started shaking. There was a bang loud enough to clear out a decade of earwax. Someone," he glared at Keats, "had left a series of exploding surprises in me station. Then the gentleman in the dock hijacked an ambulance and drove away with me missus and the head if the canine division in the back. Robin, he beat to a bloody mess. And Alex," he fell over his words, almost retching in the stand; "DCI Drake was taken to the basement," his voice shook more than he'd ever heard it before, "where she was bound up and raped."

Gene blanched in horror as he saw Keats smirk at the memory while the lawyer offered the jury the forensic evidence that proved the accusation. Gene could only hope and pray that Keats would be locked up at the end of the trial because the alternative would surely leave his knuckles raw for weeks.

"I'm sorry, DCI Hunt, I know this is difficult," the lawyer said with genuine sadness, "I just have one more question for you. In your opinion, do you believe that DCI Drake has been left with permanent damage from the assault?"

Gene felt himself shaking and gripped the stand a little harder.

"In my opinion," he spat, "I think I'm lucky that she's still here. Because a lesser person would have laid down and given up after what he put her through." He looked at the lawyer. "She will never be the same again. But that doesn't stop her fighting."

The lawyer nodded slowly.

"No further questions, your honour."

The judged nodded as the lawyer sat down.

"The defence may now proceed with questioning the witness," he announced and a figure dressed swathed in black got to his feet.

Gene stared at him.

He froze.

He swallowed.

The defence lawyer scratched his beard.

"Oh bollocks," Gene whispered.