Thank you once again to the rave reviews I've got so far! I know it isn't as big as Stranger Things (and perhaps doesn't have as many people on the edge of their seats waiting for the next chapter), but I'm really enjoying writing it - so, of course, I'm glad so many other people have found this enjoyable too.

The new Endeavour episode dropped on Sunday just there, so to anybody who has or hasn't seen it - I will be taking my own divergent route, no matter what may transpire in the 5th season. I may weave in some of the canon detail, but since I started this before the new series began, I feel I can take some liberties.

This chapter felt really great to write, so reviews and kudos are always appreciated!

Of course, Joan had never thought to predict this.

Normally, when it came to her Dad's work, it generally did stay at the door, just as he always requested. Often, it felt like a demand, but she'd been perfectly content to leave it at that. Police work never sounded like something she wanted to get involved with.

She'd still held that thought when the gun had been held to her head.

When she'd asked her Dad, doing the dishes one night, what it was actually like to face off against people who had killed others, Fred Thursday had looked more severe in his life than she'd ever seen him. For all the world, he'd been a loving father unlike any she'd known – and he'd been tough, and fair, and honest, and kind. Kindness was king, he'd always said.

And she'd always believed him.

"It's like looking at death. Just laughing at you. But you stare right back, and you know – you know you've done right by them."

"By who?" she'd asked, although the frown that had creased her brow had most likely already shown that she'd known the answer.

Her Dad had turned round to look at her with his hands in yellow rubber gloves, still in the sink, with a grim frown on his face, and he'd become Detective Inspector Thursday in that moment– not her father.

"The poor buggers they ripped lives away from,"

She'd always remembered that statement since, because to her, that was a confirmation of the one thing she'd known was true –

The world never, ever stopped trying to get back at you.

The bank robbery had felt like a premonition of some kind – even when she'd been hanging out with Paul Marlock from before - who'd charmed her into trusting him, like all the others - she'd always thought it would be like always. No one was ever good enough for her Dad, so she had always assumed that it was always just a tick away from being over. And then she'd start again.

Except, of course, she'd always made the keen remark that being a copper's daughter made life more difficult than it ought to be.

So, yes.

The gun at her head had shot her into reality, rather than into oblivion, and it had said everything to her that she'd tried to forcefully ignore for all the time that she'd been young and innocent and careless with her dreams:

You can never truly escape the dark, when the people around you eternally stand at its mouth.

Morse had always said that to her, on the many times he'd offered to walk her home; each time, and they'd launch into a whole new batch of short-lived conversations that seemed to fizz and burst and splutter into laughter all before they reached her front door.

"But surely there're other things you want?" She'd asked one night, back from dancing at a club that had wrecked her feet, making her walk with her heels slung over her shoulder again, hair pinned up into a freefalling wave of black curls that had framed her face, swiping into her eyes every time the lightest of breezes had blown past. The streetlamps had been on again, as they were every night, but Morse had always managed to make it feel like a romantic notion was involved somehow, even when he gave her a respectable berth, forever aware of what the word 'manners' referred to when it came to behaviour.

Such a gentleman. Such a daft gentleman, Joan had thought, unable to help herself as she'd looked up into his face for what felt the thousandth, ten-thousandth, hundred-thousandth time –

Every time she looked at him, it was like seeing him for the first time again, right on her doorstep like he had been ever since.

Like he had been from the very start.

"Other things? Like what?" Morse had shrugged his lithe shoulders in his dark suit, which looked ultimately a good deal darker than his first ones. He had seemed to be dipping into more sombre colours as of late, like he felt wearing his sadness on his back was the best way to rid himself of it, every time he shed his jacket. She hadn't seen him do any such thing. Apparently Morse intended to wear his sadness like a cloak of shame – crowding his sorrow onto his shoulders to try and be stronger, when all it did was make him vulnerable.

"You know perfectly well what," Joan had smirked at him, taking a step forward to look right up to him, his face tilted down towards her like he ought to be concentrating on her words alone, and for some reason had been neglecting that duty.

God, how she wished that was true.

"I really don't," his face had been the picture of innocence, the hint of a laugh on his lips as he sighed, somehow the laughter still escaping even when he'd tried to conceal it.

Joan had stood there for a moment longer, just looking at him – just to try and see what it was about him that seemed to make her feel like she was standing at the door again, aged seven, looking up at the policemen with her wide eyes and curious frown. To try and understand why these people had fascinated her at such a young age, even when she'd been trying to run away from them and their world all her life since.

He'd looked almost… unreal in that light. The night light. The light that truly seemed to wander around after him as he watched from corners and ran headlong into danger. The night was his mistress – and she'd never allow Joan to have him.

So for all his soft expression, only slightly confused before it had slipped into something a little more understanding, Joan had stepped back again, slapping a hand on his lapel as she avoided his gaze, the line of her mouth resigned to the fact that he wasn't feeling what she did.

And, more than likely, he never would, if she had any kind of idea about it.

So, when she'd been standing with that gun to her head, his answer had slipped through her head.

Other things? Like what?

Watching his face contort into despair and anguish and fear for her life, his eyes wide and panicked, pale face drained of any of the remaining colour he might have had left in it, she'd thought that perhaps he'd secretly known what he'd wanted to say. What other things he might've wanted to do.

Stop that gun from being pointed at her temple, for example, with the blood rushing to her head as she decided that death was staring her in the face, grinning at the misfortune she'd managed to land everyone with.

Joan Thursday had decided, then and there, that she'd had enough of staring Death in the eye.

It had felt like a blur – the whole thing. By the time her and Morse had been shoved into action, pushed around the bank's maze of corridors like misbehaving children, Joan had felt sore in every muscle of her body, aching in all imaginable ways. Her chest hurt from crying and shouting and her heart beating so frantically; her cheeks felt stiff from tears she had no recollection of shedding; her legs felt tight from the pain, the high heels taking stabs at the soles of her feet as she tripped and stumbled into each room.

And through all of it – Morse.

Sweet, honest, gentle Morse, who she had still remembered from that first day on her doorstep, too kind to come within a six metre radius of her for fear of being untoward, and suddenly he was shouting at bank robbers – who were armed to the teeth - trying desperately to save the both of them. And she'd seen his job for real that day – all the pure, unrelenting terror and seething danger that had no reservations in snapping its teeth at you if it knew you feared the consequences.

"Just let us go! We'll only hold you up!"

Joan had felt some nagging weight on her chest, like a grudge that vehemently refused to shift from the forefront of her mind, and even then she'd been aware that any false moves and that would be the least of her worries.

The underground network of passages – where archives where generally held – had all blurred into a haze of beige walls and shifting bodies, the thundering feet reverberating around the tight, compact nature of the corridors, and her head had been swimming so badly that she'd hadn't even been sure exactly who was who by that point.

The only thing she had been able to keep a track of was Morse – he'd somehow managed to keep a grip on her as she'd been pushed through the hole broken into the wall, his hands a therapeutic warmth on her arms as she'd felt her body temperature fluctuate with every slight movement. A feeling akin to nausea – but not quite there yet – had already settled in long ago, but she had begun to wonder how much longer it would take before her stomach would empty its contents on the floor.

Morse's voice had punctuated her thoughts again, as she felt him holding her by her arms, close into him for support.

"Well, leave her at least – she's done! You only have to look at her!"

His voice had sounded a little high-pitched then – raw, by most standards, considering how often he'd conducted himself with such composure that you almost could've been fooled into thinking he didn't care.

Joan had since learned that Morse would be one of the first, and last, people to give a damn on the whole earth.

They'd already begun to half jog down the corridors again, dim lights causing the shadows to appear like monstrous dogs on the corners, as Morse had turned round to her as he'd walked backwards with about as much grace as a trapeze artist.

How could he still manage to look so composed during such a thing like this?

"If anything happens, give this to your father."

"But – what is it?" Her voice had been frantic – the book in her hands had felt almost weightless, the lump of fear in her throat and shivering in her nerves making all feeling spare nausea and a sense of disparity of reality possible. Nothing felt like it had been making sense for hours now – like a montage of photos all put in the wrong order, and completely ridiculous in their own, individual right.

"It's the reason Cedric Clissold was killed," Morse had said, voice returning to his somewhat reserved tone as he'd looked over his shoulder, the scent of his cologne mixing with the damp heat of the passage and the faint sweat on his skin – the breezy lightness of his perfume still seemed heady in this place. Like sex withheld in a night breathing to be passionate.

God, her head was spinning.

"It's blank!" she'd said helplessly, watching as Morse had groaned in agitation, glancing up at the ceiling for some divine intervention that she knew he didn't believe in. If anything, this had been just another cock-up in the grand show of cock-ups.

The names after that – that he'd recited to her – had all felt like a foreign language. Something to do with horses, and even then she'd thought it was stupid. Why did these things have to happen over such trivial pursuits? Why did murder have to be the outcome of men's silly games?

She'd promised herself long ago that she was never going to involve herself in this life.

Now she was beginning to see the reality of her logic.

They'd been continually pushed from one wall to the next, Morse's face the only constant in the whir of action. She'd been paying attention to his words alright – Felix Lorimer, Nina Lorimer, Paul Marlock – but his features had swum into clarity as they'd been shoved up against the next wall, the shouts of 'Move it!' in the background like a broken vinyl record that jumped every time you thought the needle was back in place. He'd look like he was trying to be calm whilst standing on a cliff edge; to be reassuring when the dagger stuck out from his heart. His blue eyes – hypnotic, bright, tired around the edges – had seemed fierce in that dingy light, all traces of formality gone when he could see his own fear reflected in her eyes. His hair was mussed, his suit was stained – dirty and foul and roughed up as they were, they'd found themselves entirely with each other, and his voice had been the one thing she'd been able to concentrate on when she felt like the din around her was crashing around her ears, just so it could see her crumble.

In his wake, she was doing no such thing.

"Well we were meant to, but they intended to kill him,"

"Keep it down!" Morse's bony shoulders had dug into her own as he'd been shoved past with considerable and unnecessary force, the entirety of this affair making Joan feel like she couldn't breathe. He had winced in retaliation, keeping his thin, bowed lips shut for fear that any snarky comment on his part would land him in boiling water when he'd just gotten used to hot.

As they'd stood there, waiting to see what was coming next, Joan had looked up at him, his chin hovering right near her forehead, her arms cradled up to her chest as she'd tried to ignore the thumping rhythm of her heart in her chest, like her rib cage had been almost trying to break free of the flesh.

"Are they going to kill us?" she'd muttered, staring at his tie with a feigned interest as she'd tried to regulate her breathing. His own released breath had been long and dreadful, like he wasn't sure himself.

"I don't – I don't know," he'd muttered back truthfully, dipping his head a little as his forehead brushed her own as he looked round the corner. His cologne had invaded her senses, smelling her own sweat along with his, the faint taste of blood in her mouth where she'd bitten her tongue and been too preoccupied to care.

The first man – to hell if she'd forgotten his name – had shouted something incomprehensible as he'd thundered round the corner again. Before she'd even known what was happening, the gun had been aimed and Morse had pulled her flush to him, arms wrapped around her head and ears protectively as the shot had nearly shook her brain in her skull, letting out a whimper as her cheek had rubbed painfully on the material of Morse's suit. She'd felt his own frantic heart through his thin frame, threatening to burst free of his own body, and everything about him had surrounded her like a solitary ocean, even as the roughness of the wall on her back had scraped her skin through the material of her dress.

Everything about this had been rotten – such a terrible, horrid scenario that she had felt almost detached from the whole thing.

He'd refused to let her go until absolutely necessary – his hands cradling her head against him, like he'd feared she'd crumble to pieces like broken china if he even let go for a moment. He'd been warm, but in a rushed way – the hot flush of adrenaline and fear, of his cheek pressed into her hair, and she'd thought perhaps this sudden burst of familiarity between them was too much, when he'd spent months avoiding her very carefully, out of dual respect and genuine modesty.

The rest seemed a blur after that.

Sitting with her Dad in the sitting room had never felt more surreal. Even her mum's hot cup of tea and her Dad's broad palm smoothing her back had done nothing to assuage the guilt and worry she'd kept bottled up all day.

Ronnie Gidderton's blood, smeared on her knee and crusted under her fingernails had almost been too distinct for her to keep a hold of herself.

"You fell foul, that's all. A good night's sleep – you'll feel better in the morning, eh, Mum?"

Her Dad's words had sounded hollow, even when she'd sensed the reassuring presence of him at her side. The kind of secure, safe weight that he carried, that always let her know he was there should she need him.

She'd been independent, once.

Always told people she could take care of herself.

Staring at the grate of the fireplace, she felt like she was seven years old again.

And that had terrified her beyond belief.

She'd nodded mutely, the 'Yeah' she'd uttered sounding like a choke rather than a response.

Her chest had felt hollow. All the remorse and pain and guilt had vanished, to leave her with some empty, vacant space in her psyche that seemed unable to deal with what had happened. Her heart had slowed, her blinking had slowed – her whole body had slowed; the process of shock sending her limbs into shutdown; like rebooting the brain after a coma.

The evening had drifted by. The light had dulled – her room felt empty. She kept seeing the blood, even when she'd closed her eyes; the quilt did gave her no comfort, every time she imagined the metallic tang of the liquid on her skin, pervading her senses like a premonition right on her doorstep. The shadows crawled across the walls. The quilt felt heavy on her shoulders, her hair having been tangled mess from when she got home, and having stayed that way since.

The only thing that had seemed to overrule every terrible, vivid memory was him.

No matter what she had tried to divert her mind with – anything but to have to relive the realistically short but seemingly endless reel of the bank robbery – she had still managed to find her way back to the moment he'd held her. The moment he'd cradled her like a young girl, when she had told herself all along that she was a young woman.

That she needed no one.

To have that shattered before her very eyes – like a mirror cracking into so many pieces that you couldn't see the reflection for the shards – was too sensitive a subject to contemplate.

Vision or not – Joan had thought she'd had all this figured out years ago. Who she was. What she liked. What she couldn't agree with.

And then –

And then –

She'd buried her head in her pillow and refused to move for the rest of the night.

She'd watched the light creep across her bedroom floor – a signal to a day that felt like it oughtn't to have passed. Time had suspended itself long ago for her – the memories felt too fresh, too real, to ever consider wiping them from her mind so quickly.

So much for a good night's sleep, then.

It had been a decision, of course, that she'd never thought to make until now.

Cushy lives lead to cushy thoughts, and that had been Joan's home life since the moment she could see.

Yet…

After everything that had happened, Joan had perhaps thought that trying to remain in a place that clearly didn't have what you needed was perhaps a waste of everyone's time.

The suitcase had come out; the clothes had been folded in, about as neatly as she could manage with her barely trembling fingers – just enough to make her realize the severity of what she had been doing.

And then – out the door.

She'd put on her coat and walked right out – no hesitation, no fear, no consideration.

The parting hug her Dad had left her with felt like a mistake, just before she'd gone up to bed the night before – she'd still remembered the warmth of him; the genuine affection that only a father could give, paralleled only by her mother.

But that had been that.

If Joan Thursday was anything, she was resolute.

The early morning chill had hit her in the face – her tear-stiffened cheeks battered by a cold air that had been barred from her hot, heady room the night before, the place almost stifling her like her dreams had choked her. Some small, terrible part of her had felt that she was being silly – that all of this was her overdramatic response to being exposed to a reality that had never been that far away from her door. Maybe if she'd taken the time to observe things better, this wouldn't have had to happen.

But as things were – she had had to choose, and she'd chosen the only real path open to her.

Departure.

The morning seemed to hold no real reverence to her situation – as always, nature proved to be blissfully ignorant to her struggle, because it had never been its concern. It already had a job to do – and she had been trying to prove a point. She didn't need babying anymore. Certainly not when the blood was still refusing to come out from under her fingernails.

She'd only faintly heard the car behind her – had expected that it might be some passer-by on their way to say their own goodbyes to some long-standing friend, but she hadn't been prepared for it.

Her mind, swirling with thoughts of her mum and her dad and herself, she hadn't expected it.

"Miss Thursday?"

She'd stopped short at the voice, hearing the soft, murmured way he'd said her name – not her true name, but the one he had for her. The one that had stuck no matter how many darned times she'd told him to un-stuff his shirt and talk to her like she was the age she was.

He'd been steadfast. In so many ways.

"Where are you going?"

Her gaze caught sight of him in the early morning light – a soft blue and pale, pale gold haze that made him look like a sepia photograph that had spent too long in the sun. For once, not in uniform, the burgundy, zip-up jumper showing up some red locks to his hair she hadn't noticed before, a bronze glow off of his skin that seemed dulled by the impending reality of what she was doing – what he could see she was doing.

His eyes had also been something of a spectacle – frowning, along with his mouth, for once unsure of what he was seeing in front of him. Seeing her, yes, but not seeing her reasons.

For once, being blind to the facts.

Her gaze had been directed to the ground, trying to calm her nerves by feeling the slight breeze brush across her cheeks – for a moment allowing herself to pretend it was his hand on her skin, brushing away the tears she had stubbornly refused to shed thus far.

"Like this?"

So many questions, she'd thought – and Lord, she'd wanted to tell him. Tell him everything that had haunted her in such a short space of time. To spill her every secret, not just about that incident, but about him too. To tell him exactly why she couldn't look at him and not help but see her Dad, even when his angelic innocence prevailed upon her to fall helplessly, foolishly in love with him, even when it was the most implausible thing she'd ever considered.

Fall in love with a policeman.

What a laugh that would've been.

"I have to," Even the words had sounded meek to her. Her brow had furrowed, as if to ask herself why that was her answer. Why was this necessary?

One look from him and already her resolve was crumbling.

Damn him.

"Well, where will you go?"

His face had said it all – utter shock, despair, anguish, guilt; something of his own to add to the mix when he considered how truly awful it must have felt to stand in front of him and reject him even now – even when her very being, her very sense – told her that Morse, whoever he may have claimed to be, was not a man to do things lightly.

Coming after her had been a choice. A conscious choice, with some kind of reasoning behind it.

"I don't know,"

She'd looked at him. Carefully.

"Stay,"

The pleading in his voice had almost broken her – some sort of affection that couldn't be translated accordingly. The words would never meet up to the feeling.

"I can't,"

"Just give it time. Everything that happened… just give it a chance,"

His blue eyes – always so hypnotic and unreadable – had lost their scholarly stare, often so removed from what other people said around him. They had been fixed, right on her, a glassy, wet look to them that hinted to a verge of tears that he didn't feel quite enough prepared for. Even his frown had been one of discontent and misery – a pained, hurt look that showed that he knew all too well that his efforts had made no difference.

Ever trying to read his expression, Joan had watched carefully, the panic subsided, as he'd tried to elaborate.

"You mean the world to them,"

She continued to stare on.

"You… - you mean the world -"

The break in his voice – the tilt of his head; the sharp, broken look in his eyes, glinting silently with something he would never admit to out loud; all of it made her stop. Made her blink slowly – only twice – the whole time he had stood there. Swallowing carefully, having recovered from his somewhat fretful admission.

Joan had sighed, turning away her head for a brief moment, placing her suitcase on the ground. She could hear the train in the distance – a breath away from her next words.

Morse's face had contorted into one of blind, childish innocence – shock at the world for having been so cruel to him yet again. She'd seen that look before – blatant and open, for all his youth and beauty, and acquired, humble intelligence. But she had caused this pain, this time, and she'd tried to wilfully ignore that fact as she'd looked up at him – the one man who seemed to be truly, truly heartbroken that she'd bared to think of herself as so out of place, in a world he felt she'd belonged in all along.

"Look after them. Dad won't understand,"

She'd meant it as a request, but he'd taken it as a wound. He'd let out a tentative, shaky breath, breathing in quickly to try and hold back the evident tears.

She had seen him furiously biting the inside of his cheek, blinking once or twice to try and clear his eyes, hands fidgeting by his sides as his chest had risen and fallen with a barely perceptible movement.

"Well… if you need anything… money, or a voice on the phone - you know where to find me."

He had done a rotten job of trying to hide that sadness, Joan had thought.

He'd shed the jacket, it seemed.

It had been pouring out of him – his voice had become ragged then, choking on his words as he had tried to talk around the lump in his throat.

He's –

She'd refused to finish the sentence for herself.

Her hand had come up to rest on his cheek, making him smile back at her weakly, his pale, long-fingered hand coming up to hold her wrist tenderly, his skin cool against her own. She had smoothed her thumb across the scrape of his cheek – a mark upon his face, interrupting the bridge of golden freckles that seemed to dance across his skin like glitter on water. The scenery had seemed to pull him into focus – his sandy blond hair seen in the golden buildings of Oxford; his green-blue eyes like the waters and shrubs that bordered the lakes; the pale skin a testament to the English weather that never let up.

He was Morse.

And by God, she loved him.

"You should get something on that,"

He'd smiled again, sniffing in once – a sort of apologetic grin that lent itself to his sorrow. Her hand had slipped from his face, already missing the solid form he had held in her life for so long.

All the way back to the start.

Detective Constable Morse.

What a title, she'd thought.

Now –

Now, he was just a man.

"Take care of yourself, Morse."

He'd nodded in reply, agreeing with a 'Yep' inaudibly, his smile having been weak and faltering with every minute that had passed. He'd licked his lips once – dry from the cold – and she'd smiled at him one last time, perhaps trying to convey a message he wouldn't understand without words.

Joan had turned her back, her suitcase in hand once again, refusing to let him see the tears that had made their way to her eyes, gathering like subjects to the beheading of the Queen.

"You too… Miss Thursday,"

His voice had cracked, and although she couldn't see him, she could hear him breathe in once, the tears rasping at the back of his throat as she had walked away from him.

She never expected to see him again.