TITLE: Is There Something I Should Know?
AUTHOR: bolly69
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or concept; they belong to the BBC/Ashley/Matthew, etc.
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Apologies for the long delay, but thanks for sticking with it!
Again, poor Alex, and poor Gene!
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Chapter 7
Gene trawled through the files and papers on Layton to find more on his connection to the two dead men. Enlisting Ray and Chris's help had seemed like a good idea, but neither knew what they were looking for; how could they, he couldn't spill his guts to them about Alex. Shit.
Lifting out yet more papers and files, Gene spotted something caught in the corner of an archive box: Layton's notebook. The one Alex had acquired from his workshop. Prising it from the box, he flicked through the dog-eared pages, scanning Layton's almost illegible scribble of tide times and docking points. Bastard Layton and his so called 'Empire'. He envisaged Alex doing the waggley-finger thing at that. He smiled. Then something scrawled in a margin inside the back cover caught his eye; it was written sideways and he had to turn the book to read it.
There it was.
In Layton's messy handwriting.
One word.
That made his head spin and his stomach churn all at the same time.
Just one word.
'Artemis'
He frowned.
The file in his desk that he had recovered from Edgehampton.
From the hot sticky vault.
That he had been trapped in.
With Alex.
Sweaty and desperate.
Hot. And sweaty.
In that red bra.
Spilling out of that red bra…
Oh Jesus…
He dragged his thoughts back to the present. Artemis. There was something in that file the government wanted to keep secret badly enough that they had their spooky bastards impersonate police officers and remove dead bodies from the morgue. Gene glanced up at his officers, oblivious to the gravity of this new revelation.
"Right you two, tea break. Go and have a cuppa then come back to these files with fresh eyes. We need to find something" Ray and Chris didn't argue, and left his office.
Unlocking his desk drawer and removing the Artemis file, Gene tried to remember what little he knew about it. Not a great deal really, other than it related to secret atomic weapon tests. What else did it involve? He remembered Alex had commented "Goddess of the Hunt" in relation to the naming of it. That had tickled him. And he was sure he'd seen a twinkle in her eye when she'd said it. That certainly had prophetic significance now in hindsight. Indeed she was, he sighed deeply at the thought of her, wanted to go to her, to know she was okay, he felt uneasy that she'd gone home alone after the maggot incident; but he needed to know what linked Layton to Artemis, to him, to Alex. Scanning the pages in the file made nothing clearer to him; he didn't understand most of it; dates and calculations and scientific mumbo-jumbo. Maybe Alex would see something he was missing. He scooped the Artemis file up and with a shout to Ray and Chris to keep going through the files, he left CID.
With long strides he crossed the road towards Alex's flat, glancing up longingly to her windows, unusually in darkness. Pausing on the pavement to let a car pass and to take one long final draw on his cigarette before throwing it to the ground and covering it with his boot. Doing so, he noticed something on the road glinting in the streetlight. Walking over to it, he squatted down and reached out to pick it up; catching his breath with the realisation of what it was.
Alex's flat key.
He'd know it anywhere; flat key, office key, and a small troll toy with peculiar hair; he'd watched her sitting twiddling it often enough, observed as her sleek fingers toyed with it, twirling it between them, sometimes smiling at it as though it brought back pleasant memories. If it was here on the road, and her flat was in darkness, where was she? A surge of blood rushed to his head, bile rose in his throat; oh god he couldn't lose her now, not now he'd found her. Pushing upright with head spinning, he tracked his eyes around the deserted street.
His voice was a pleading whisper, "Alex…"
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Waves.
It was the sound of waves.
On a beach. A beautiful, warm, golden-sand beach.
With blue skies and clear turquoise water.
If she could just open her eyes she'd see it.
But she wasn't warm, she was cold. Very cold.
And the ground felt hard and uncomfortable under her body.
And her head thumped, nausea rising.
And the waves thudded against something that wasn't sand.
Metal. With the smell of diesel and oil and river silt.
A strange taste in her mouth, familiar…
Blood.
Alex's stomach lurched, blood was never good.
Her head ached, spinning again, and her limbs throbbed from the restraints that tightly bound her wrists and ankles.
Alex forced opened her eyes slowly, not even sure they were open at first it was so dark. Eventually as her eyes adjusted, she made out vague shapes of where she was; what she was in. The hull of a barge.
Something familiar…
Just like the one she was shot in.
Layton's. Oh God…
Suddenly she remembered walking home, still shaken by the delivery of maggots, but with the giddy anticipation of Gene coming home to her later.
She didn't hear or see Layton as the wad of cloth closed over her mouth; sickeningly sweet; her eyelids too heavy to stay open.
And now here, cold and afraid.
So this is how it ends, as it began.
Alex cried, silent tears falling down her face. She cried for Molly, that she had failed to get back to her, blaming herself, silently apologizing to her daughter; she cried for Gene, that she had battled him and here for so long, and they had finally found each other only to lose him now, for him to lose her; and she cried for herself, for feeling so alone, so afraid, like a child, like little Alex all over again who had just lost her parents.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…" she shifted her body, moved into a foetal position, rocking to comfort herself.
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She'd drifted into unconsciousness again, coming round to the sound of footsteps. She prayed it was Gene, or one of the team, but she was disappointed; a kick to her hip confirmed that. Layton was back. She let out a low moan, the pain lingering in her cold muscles.
"Wakey wakey Alex. Now, what am I gonna do with you?"
Alex tried to speak, her voice hoarse and breaking, "Layton, what do you want from me?"
"Oh, Alex. Don't you know? You're a clever girl, Alex. Haven't you worked it out yet? I didn't expect DCI Hunt to figure it out, stupid northern bastard copper. But I expected more of you Alex" His voice was whiney, mocking.
Alex couldn't think straight, make sense of his words, "Why were you involved with the Prices? Why do you ask for me in the future? Ask for me by name? Why me? That day?"
"The future, Alex? Today, tomorrow, now, then – it's all meaningless. All of it. And you still don't know?" He laughed, a bitter, hoarse rattle in his chest. "They didn't tell you, did they?"
"Tell me what? Who?" Now her head was spinning, "tell me…"
"They don't want you around Alex. Get rid of you and they can dethrone Hunt. Artemis wasn't about nuclear weapons Alex. The government didn't lie about that"
"…Artemis… The file… Goddess of the Hunt…"
"Yeah, that'll be you then Alex…" he laughed, a shrill twisted laugh.
"…what was… is… Artemis…"
"You'll know soon enough Alex. Once Hunt has no purpose to be here anymore…" he paused, and took in a hiss-like breath, "Do you think time is a straight line Alex? That you travel along it can never to go back to any point in that line? Mm? What if, just what if time was like a big bubble, and you could touch any point in time whenever you wanted? For whatever you wanted."
Alex's eyes were wide, half in panic and half in the knowledge of how unhinged Layton actually sounded, "What? You're insane Layton. This is all in my head, and I don't know why, but I'm going to wake up and see my daughter again, and go back to my real life…"
"Oh Alex. This is your real life" he laughed, his mocking cackle sending fear coursing through her again, "now be a good girl and go back to sleep, I've work to do…"
"No, please no, don't Arthur, please…"
The sweet smelling cloth covered her mouth again, she twisted her head to try to escape "…no, please… don't… no…"
Swirling blackness again.
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With trembling hands, Gene turned the key in the ignition of the Quattro, roaring it into life. He shouted instructions into the radio for the rest of the team, and with his heart threatening to pound out of his chest, he scoured the narrow streets nearby, frantically searching for any sign of Alex, tyres squealing as he went.
He ran a gloved hand through his hair, he couldn't lose her now, not after last night; wonderful, mind blowing, unbelievable last night. And he hadn't told her, hadn't said what he'd wanted to for the longest time; three tiny words that incapacitated him so much that he couldn't speak; hadn't told her that he loved her. And he did. He could feel it in the pit of his stomach, a long forgotten ache that he thought would never revisit; this time, maybe for the first time, not just the butterflies of youthful enthusiasm on the realisation of being part of a couple; this was different, the real thing, like a thunderbolt from above, borne from knowing and understanding and respecting someone, for seeing them for who they truly are, faults and perfections; an evolution from the pure Manc Lion lust he felt when he first met Alex into something far more. Love.
And now that ache was great, from fear of losing her.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck" his fist thumped the steering wheel, wanting to stop, rewind, to the time when Alex was safe and with him, last night, in his arms.
Gradually his circuit became wider and took him away from Fenchurch East. He didn't know where he was driving to but he drove anyway, had to do something, anything, to feel less helpless, his steel blue eyes tinged red and staring at the streets ahead; for if he stopped staring, then the tears would surely come.
No, he wouldn't lose her now. He'd find her, and if Layton was behind this he'd pay…
The crackle of the radio and Ray's voice made him jump. "Guv, you there?"
"What Ray?" his voice monotone, locking down those emotions that were fighting to be free.
"Guv, we've had a report that Layton was spotted by the river a couple days ago. Near those old boats he used to own…"
Gene interrupted, "Meet me there Ray. Now"
Bastard Layton. If he had done anything to Alex, harmed her, touched her… With a handbrake turn and smoking tyres, Gene steered the Quattro towards Tower Bridge and the other side of the river.
And hopefully to Alex.
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Thanks for reading!
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