Escalate
Setting: "That Night, a Forest Grew"


The room feels deafeningly quiet after the past two days of constant back and forth. Lundy's words killed all of our fervor, and, at least for those of us on Miami Metro's end of the table, replaced it with something acrid. I keep seeing Lundy's face after Batista asked him how he could be so sure that the Butcher was law enforcement.

"I suppose we can't be. Yet."

The finality of that statement was punctuated by his phone ringing. No one said anything as he walked out of the room to take the call, but, within moments, everyone from Homicide had glommed around Batista. We're still grouped en masse against the feds, and still circling the same points, even though Lundy left the room over ten minutes ago. Batista, Ramos, and Sanchez are rejecting the agent's theory outright; Cook is on the fence; and Masuka still believes in his computer-generated profile, has spent most of the conversation griping that no one's listening to him.

I'm the only dissenter. I agree with Lundy. It's the only interpretation that makes any sense of the manuscript: that the entire thing really is just bullshit. I couldn't see how someone as careful and methodical as the Butcher could have such a demented, contradictory snarl of ideologies. And I can't see any of it in what I remember about Moser, before or after he took off his mask.

Everyone side-eyed me when I told them that— everything except my last opinion —but no one said anything beyond lukewarm grunts of acknowledgment. They didn't have to either. I can read between their lines. They think I'm Lundy's bitch.

And who the fuck knows, maybe I am, but not over this. An icy note of dread has been spreading up from my guts, down through my extremities. Because suddenly it's not just the manuscript that makes sense. It's the rest of it. All of it.

Batista and Ramos are still talking about the Butcher's obvious religious convictions, pointing at highlighted sections in their copies of the manuscript, but I've stopped listening. I'm looking at our victims' names, remembering their mug shots and their crimes. I don't know how we never thought of it before. It seems so fucking obvious now.

Who else could've known? Some of these people were never even arrested, just came in as POI and were released, never to be seen again.

Who else would've been able to leave all these bodies and crime scenes spotless? We pulled about 50 bags out of that bay, and the most we've found is fucking rock algae and that he has an affinity for plastic wrap, duct tape, and power tools. Not a hair, not a drop of sweat, not a fingerprint, not a single mistake.

And what better profile for a vigilante killer than someone in law enforcement?

I look at Carlos Gutierrez's name. He murdered Kathy Levy, that patrol officer out in West Flagler, then evaporated into thin air. Except he didn't. The Butcher found him, tied him down with plastic wrap, then opened up his arms from wrist to clavicle, presumably sat there and watched him bleed out. Besides the cut on his cheek, Gutierrez was otherwise unharmed. His coroner report said he died slow. Like 20 minutes slow. He could've been conscious for most of it, unable to move or speak or do a single thing to help himself as he bled to death.

Who else would have that kind of fury?

I have a new, unpleasant thought.

And Moser wanting to serve me to him. It's not just that the Butcher kills criminals, that murdering me for him was some play at irony. It's that the Butcher's law enforcement himself. He could even be a cop too.

I feel a little sick to my stomach. It all makes a dizzying sort of sense.

I look back at the others, at Batista. I think maybe he knows. I think maybe all of them do. But it's easier to scramble for the alternative than to have to face that the Butcher may very well be one of us.

He could even work somewhere in the building.

I glance behind me into the station, as if expecting to see fucking LaGuerta or something holding a butcher knife and a plastic syringe. Of course, the hall looks the same as it always does.

"Hey."

I turn back to find Batista looking at me. He's been weird with me most of the day, since Lundy asked me to go with him to the Tribune office, and I get why. I'm not even sure why Lundy took me, since Batista was made lead in working the manifesto.

Not that I wasn't glad for the time alone with him…

"I haven't gotten the chance to ask," he continues, as in the close background Masuka rambles to everyone else about his MIT guy. "How's your brother doing?"

My brows fold as I look at him. "What do you mean?"

"I was just wondering if you'd talked to him."

"About what?" I glance behind me again, toward Dex's hole, even though I can't see it. "Isn't he here?"

"Wait, you didn't hear what happened?"

I feel a pang of unease. The rest of the conversation at the table has suddenly broken off, and everyone's looking at us. "Something happened to Dexter?" I ask cautiously.

They all glance at each other. I feel another pang.

"Fucking what happened?" I ask before anyone speaks, looking particularly at Batista.

"Doakes attacked him," he says after a beat. "This morning, after you and Lundy left for the Tribune."

My stomach drops a floor as heat flushes up my neck. "What?" I say, sitting up straighter. "Are you fucking serious?" But of course they are, from the expressions on their faces. Even Masuka looks uncomfortable.

"Yeah," the detective affirms.

"What happened?"

He shrugs. "I was sitting at my desk and the next thing I knew Doakes had him on the ground. He was wailing on him."

The heat is rapidly converting to rage. "Is he okay?" I ask.

"He's fine." His tone is reassuring, yet utterly ineffectual. "LaGuerta gave him the rest of the day."

"And Doakes?"

"She put him on administrative leave. Took his badge."

My blood is hitting a flash boil. Suddenly it's like I'm back outside that house, sitting in that ambulance. I couldn't believe what Doakes said to Dexter, barely ten minutes after he'd saved me. He's always had a bug up his ass about my brother, but that he had the fucking gall to suggest he had anything to do with what happened to me…

In that moment I could've fucking killed him.

"Why?" I ask. "What the fuck happened?"

"I don't know. Dex just said he jumped him."

"But what set him off?"

He shrugs again. "None of us know."

Why the fuck didn't anyone call me?

Why the fuck didn't Dexter call me?

For a beat I look between them all, searching for some answer in their faces, but of course there's nothing there. Then I abruptly shove out of my seat. "Fuck," I say to no one in particular before taking off for the door, which I rip open when I get to it, my phone already in-hand.

I've dialed my brother before I've gone three steps down the hall, and his phone rings and rings in my ear. As I turn for bullpen I almost run straight into Lundy, who looks at me strangely before I blow right past him. Because for once I'm too distracted to think about him.

As the phone rings and rings and rings…

"Fuck," I murmur when it dumps to voice mail. I stop against my desk as I wait for the beep, clamp my molars together. And then, finally…

"Jesus, Dex, what the fuck?" I say into the dead air. "I just had to hear about what happened between you and Doakes from Batista. Are you okay? Where are you? Fucking call me."

I click off, then squeeze the phone between my fingers. My gaze flicks to Doakes' empty desk. I have a passing thought of calling him too, to make him explain it and everything else to me. For awhile I've worked on letting that night go, tried to pin it on high tensions, or that maybe I misheard, somehow misinterpreted what he said through the haze of being kidnapped and tied down in plastic and nearly stabbed in the chest. I've brushed off everything he's said since. Laughed off his little comment about Dex being a junkie. But now I realize he was serious, that he's always been serious, for some godfor-fucking-saken reason.

Why?

He was my partner. I thought we were friends. Maybe we were. Before that night.

Why the fuck would he attack my brother?

I glance right, spot LaGuerta behind her desk. She seems like the only person who might know. The two of them are practically joined at the hip.

If I had any better instincts, they'd probably be directing me elsewhere as I head for her office, but I don't, and I don't care. I walk in and close the door behind me, barely able to feel my feet on the floor.

"Lieutenant," I start when she looks up at me.

"Morgan," she says. "What can I help you with?"

"I just heard what happened, between my brother and Doakes," I say, studying her as I walk up to her desk. Something like exasperation flashes across her face. "What did happen?"

"I don't know," she echoes Batista. Then adds, almost as an aside, "But maybe I should've seen it coming."

Distantly, it connects that I'm glaring at her, but I can't stop myself. "What're you talking about?" I ask.

It's a moment before she responds, carefully, "I think you should talk to your brother about it."

Something slips dangerously close to my lips, but I swallow it. For a second I'm gagged with a hundred questions, half of them bordering on accusations. "What the hell is Doakes' problem with Dexter, anyway?" I say finally. "If he's told anyone, it would be you."

Her expression stiffens. "It's not worth repeating."

"So he has told you?"

She says nothing. Maybe in a more patient moment I'd give a shit why.

"I was fucking there that night, just in case you forgot," I press. "I heard him when he said he thought Moser had some kind of connection to my brother. That's when most of this shit started." I search her eyes. "Does he still fucking think that? Does he really believe…" I choke on the rest of it, so angry I can barely think. "My own brother, that he fucking…" What?

Slowly, she stands up.

"What the fuck does he even think?" I ask. The office and everything in it seem to pulse red.

"Honestly, I don't know," she says. "I've made it clear to James that I have no interest in his conspiracy theories, and that neither I nor the department can protect him from himself."

Something that might be a scoff fires out of me. Because even if she doesn't know the specifics, she's all but confirmed it.

"So it took him beating on Dexter for you to do anything about this? And this is, what, five minutes after he skipped through his last hearing for blowing another fucking guy away? What's that make? Two in five months?"

"Be careful, Officer," she says.

I'm openly glaring at her now. "You know, I get that he's your friend— at one point I thought he was my friend too —but this is fucked. How long have you been protecting him? What the hell else has been going on that you apparently weren't even surprised that this happened?"

She's pissed too. I can see it now. Though whether it's at me or at Doakes, I have no idea. "Morgan," she says, stops. Takes a second to compose herself. "I have a long history with James, longer than anyone else in Miami Metro," she continues. "I'll admit that that's colored my judgment, but I would never knowingly put anyone in this department at risk. I had no idea things would ever escalate so far."

At this point I know I'm digging my own grave, but I don't care. I can't help myself. "Yet you should've seen it coming?"

She sets her jaw. Fucking throw me out, I want to say. Fucking stand by your bullshit indignation and throw me out of your office.

"Look," she says after a second, as she noticeably unclenches, "I understand your feelings. I'm sorry I didn't read James correctly. He's made enemies in other departments and invented these kinds of theories before, but he's always let them go. He's never taken them this far. You're right. I tend to treat him as more a friend than a subordinate, and that is my mistake. But the truth is, even if by some miracle he isn't fired, we both know he won't be able to come back to Homicide after this. Today he effectively blew up whatever remained of his career."

I don't reply. I don't know what to say.

She fills the silence. "I truly am sorry. But at least Dexter is okay. Have you had a chance to speak with him?"

"No." I shake my head.

She nods, exhales, looks away for a second. "If it's okay with your task force, why don't you take the rest of the day?" she says after a second, looking back at me.

I still feel at a loss. I don't know that there's anything she could say that would placate me. Standing here, I realize I don't even know what I want from her. It's just fucked beyond words that it ever got to this point, that Doakes ever for a second could seriously believe that Dexter was in league with Brian Moser, or whatever he thinks. That, what, he knew? That he fed me to Moser?

He saved my life, that night and a hundred times since.

"I may," I say finally. I don't know how long I was silent. Maybe only a couple seconds. "I need to clear my head."

She nods. "I can clear it with Lundy."

"No, that's okay," I say. "I'll talk to him." Though I'm not sure what I'm going to say.

She nods again.

For a beat we just look at each other. I don't know what else I want to say to her, if there even is anything, and I know as the moment ticks by, as I search her again, that we're done. Suddenly all I really want is to go. Anywhere. Away.

So I turn and head out the door, leave it open as I found it. Go to my desk and grab my blazer and my purse, swing them both over my arm.

As I'm walking back toward the briefing room, I run into Lundy again. He's got his phone to his ear, but he lowers it when I approach him. Maybe he was listening to his messages or something.

"Hey," I say. Our kiss on the bench outside the Tribune feels like it happened three weeks ago and between other people, or possibly not at all. But even through the rage pulsating behind my corneas, I feel a little calmer just being this close to him. Just talking to him.

"Hey," he replies, in that slightly lame way of his. "Something up?" He glances at my crap in my arms.

"Yeah," I say. I don't want to explain it to him. Or maybe I do, but I can't. Not here and now, anyway. "I need to take the rest of the day, if that's alright with you. I've already cleared it with LaGuerta."

"Sure. Everything alright?"

He makes me feel so fucking transparent. "I don't know. I'll let you know tomorrow."

He looks vaguely concerned, but he nods. "Please do."

A current seems to pass between us. For a second I feel like he might reach out for me, even as we stand like two yards from the glass doors of the briefing room. I'm not sure how I'm going to respond when he does.

But then he doesn't. "I'll see you tomorrow," he says instead.

"Yeah," I say. "Tomorrow."

We look at each other a second longer than necessary before I break the eye contact, go directly for the stairs instead of the elevator.

But those warm feelings for Lundy fade quickly the further away from him I get. By the time I get to the last step and push out the door into the lobby, my thoughts have already swung back to Doakes and my brother. As I walk for the exit, I pull my phone from my pocket and dial Dexter again, exhale as I press the phone to my ear.

It rings and rings and rings.

Dumps to voice mail.

Because fucking of course it does.