Once again, a big thankyou to rantandrumour from Luigis for beta-ing! Fankoo!

Divide and Conquer

Chapter 3

Staring at the plain ceiling was becoming tiresome already and it became more so as the hours dragged by. Alex had had an awkward night. She had only slept intermittedly. Her mind being in turmoil and the constant back pain had caused her to wake repeatedly through the night.
She knew she wanted to sleep. She was tired in both body and mind but it seemed that sleep just wasn't to be.
During these periods of being awake, Alex had repeatedly tried to move her unresponsive legs. She knew it was irrational but she knew she had to try. It was the only way she would ever convince herself of her predicament.
She lay there concentrating time and time again, desperately willing her legs to receive even the tiniest of signals from her brain, but there was nothing. No feeling, no sensation. It was as if her legs were simply no longer there. The feeling of failure each time her legs failed to move only served to reinforce Alex's sense of helplessness.
She had long since lost track of how many times she had woken up during the night. Each time she looked to her side as best she could to see the small digital clock on the bedside table indicating that it was only half an hour or so since she had last looked.
Alex had thought through the night about where she would normally be. If she hadn't been struck by the car she would be back at her flat, curled up under her warm blue blanket with a cushion beneath her head in her usual sleeping place - her sofa.
Rarely did Alex ever opt to sleep in her own bed, warm and comfortable as it was. The danger of missing vital messages seeping in from the real world through her television was too great, and she had become so accustomed to the sofa that sleeping on it now seemed normal. And when she did sleep in her own bed, she knew she was a fidgety sleeper - always dreaming and rolling over.
Now she couldn't even do that.
Several times in the night during her drowsier moments Alex had automatically tried to roll over, only for her body to remind her that she was no longer capable of doing even that.
In these dark moments with no light in her room except for the moonlight through the blinds, Alex felt like a fool. She was angry, she was crushed. She was sad and devastated. More humiliatingly, she was helpless, stuck lying on her back in this hospital bed and unable to do anything for herself, requiring assistance for everything.
She wondered if the hit and run had been intended to kill her. Perhaps it would have been better if it had. At least it wouldn't have taken long. This surely had to be worse.
She didn't agree with police taking the law into their own hands but a part of Alex was enraged at having her freedom and independence snatched from her in such a way. She had to admit that a small part of her wouldn't object if the person who did this to her was ever caught and left alone with Gene and Ray for ten minutes - something she would normally strongly object to.
Yet another part of her wondered just what the point was of getting angry. What possible good was it going to achieve? She knew grief, anger and tears were a perfectly normal reaction. She was a psychologist, of course she knew these things, but knowing it didn't make it any easier to come to terms with.
Alex sighed hopelessly. At the very least, she wanted to be able to sit up, to brush her hair, to put a little make up on so that she at least appeared reasonably presentable.
She looked at the clock again. 02:19.
This was going to be a long dark night.

Alex's eyes fluttered open again slowly. There was light. It was morning. Alex reasoned that she must have eventually drifted off to sleep at some point during her restless night.
She didn't really want to wake up. What was there to wake up for? It wasn't as if she could get up and do anything. She knew the nurses would be in to see her at some point to tend to her needs and give her a wash - another humiliation.
Alex closed her eyes again, her vision falling back into darkness once more. Her back was already greeting her with the pain she was slowly but reluctantly becoming accustomed to. It would be better if she went back to sleep before the pain got any worse.
"Good morning Alex."
She opened her eyes. She hadn't realised there was another person in the room.
"I'm sorry. I let myself in," the figure sitting next to the bed announced apologetically. "I didn't mean to startle you."
Alex turned her head towards her visitor, her neck aching from lying in one position for several days.
DCI Keats sat confidently in the chair beside Alex's bed, the very same chair formerly occupied by Gene. Alex looked up at him. Keats's intense stare was almost unnerving for someone who had just woken up. She watched as he reached down and picked something up from next to his seat.
"Here," Keats said offering a paper bag to Alex.
Alex took the bag and reached inside it with curiosity from where she lay.
"I appreciate that you probably have very little to do all day Alex," Keats explained. "So I took the liberty of picking you up some magazines on the way in. I know it's not much but it should give you something to focus your mind on for a while."
"That's very kind sir," Alex responded gratefully as she removed the half a dozen magazines from the bag and looked through their various titles.
She really was grateful. Lying in her hospital bed had long since become tedious. Her frustration and boredom was only ever broken by the appearance of her doctor coming to examine her and check for any return of feeling or sensation or a nurse coming to take care of her, or see if she needed anything. The only other welcome interruption until now had been Gene, the rest of CID working flat out on tracking Alex's attacker.
She placed the magazines gently down by her side on the bed, easily within her reach. She would begin reading them later, relieved that now she at least had something to do other than stare at the ceiling.
"I just came to see how you were," Keats announced. "You're a vital member of this team Alex, and I'm keeping an open mind about this hit and run...'incident', shall we say?"
Alex took in the sight of her visitor. There was something about the way he had said the word 'incident' that was odd.
"I suppose you must know how I am sir," Alex reluctantly answered looking once again to the ceiling with a sigh. "Fractured spine, the T8 vertebra to be exact. It must all be in the case file by now."
Keats nodded slowly and silently, removing his glasses, as he did so. "I am so sorry Alex. This should never have happened to one of our finest officers."
Alex nodded slightly. She certainly wished it had never happened. "Are there any leads yet? Anything at all?"

"No. Nothing at all. It's very disappointing," Keats replied. "I would have expected better, especially with the victim being one of our own officers, but I suppose I should have expected as much from Hunt's department."
Alex sighed, disappointed that even here and now Keats was using her situation to snipe at Gene.
"It is early days sir," she reminded her senior officer from her bed. "Breakthroughs don't always come right away."
She watched as Keats hesitated for a moment, as if pondering whether or not to speak. "As I said, DCI Hunt is handling this case but I have certain...certain lines of enquiry I wish to pursue myself."
Alex was intrigued. What leads could there be to follow that Keats would want to investigate on his own?
"Do you have a suspicion?" she asked. The thought of the perpetrator being brought to justice was a very small consolation but it was still news that would cheer her up at least a little.
"It's nothing." Keats shook his head and placed his glasses back on as if changing his mind. "I forget you're not on the case. No, you take it easy and recover. As soon as there is the slightest bit of information you will be the first to know. I promise you that, Alex."
"Sir," Alex pressed the issue. "If you suspect someone or something then please, you must liase with DCI Hunt."
Keats paused for a moment. He looked Alex over, his eyes making a point of wandering down to her paralysed legs and lingering there as if contemplating. Finally he leant forwards, leaning his arms on the edge of the bed, his face close to Alex and spoke quietly into her ear.
"Well that's just the trouble isn't it Alex?" he whispered in a tone as cold as ice. "I can't tell the officer whom I suspect, can I now?"
Alex said nothing for several moments, disbelief overwhelming her at what she took to be an absurd accusation. He had to be joking, surely? She watched as Keats simply sat up and leant back in his chair, casually crossing one leg over the other as he gauged the injured DIs reaction.
"You don't seriously suspect Gene?" Alex asked with surprise clear in her voice.
"Look at the facts Alex!" Keats emphasised. "Look at what you've been doing lately!"
"How do you mean?" Alex quizzed.
"Your investigation into the death of DI Tyler has rattled Hunt time and time again. Keats spoke more forcefully now. "And the deeper you have dug Alex, the angrier he has gotten! I've seen it." He paused, letting the words sink in. "You've seen it."
"No," Alex disagreed from where she lay. "This is ridiculous"
"The pair of you," he said, ignoring her, intent on continuing to hammer his point home. "You've fought like cat and dog lately. You can't deny this Alex."
"With respect sir-" Alex paused with a grimace as her back surged with pain yet again and she had to take a moment to let it pass. "With respect sir, we always bicker."
"Oh this isn't bickering Alex." Keats shook his head. "Where has the famous chemistry gone between you two?"
Alex said nothing, too amazed at the accusation to even think of a response.
"Face it Alex. DCI Hunt had Sam Tyler killed. Now you've got too close to the truth and he's tried to have you killed too, only the attempt failed and put you here." The certainty in Keats's voice was absolute.
"No, that's not possible Sir," Alex defended Gene. "He was first on scene after the car hit me. He did everything he could to keep me safe until the ambulance arrived. I tell you, Gene had nothing to do with this."
"First on the scene?" Alex felt her anger rise as Keats actually laughed at the suggestion. "First on the scene? He wasn't with you in the road though was he? No, DCI Hunt was safely at the side of the road, wasn't he Alex? Letting you go on ahead? Wasn't he?"
"Sir you have this all wrong." Alex's frustration was building and she felt herself growing tense. She would have argued more, but her back surged with pain once again, freezing her. It felt as if every single nerve was on fire. She let out an involuntary whimper and saw Keats pause momentarily in his rant as he watched her intently.
After a few moments of agony, Alex's pain subsided once again to a level she now thought of as normal and she let out a pained breath.
"Shhhh...This is upsetting you." Keats leant forwards again placing a hand gently on Alex's shoulder, his thumb soothingly stroking her through her hospital gown.
"Sir," Alex spoke more quietly, the pain clearly agitating her. "You are wrong about Gene."
"Try not to get angry Alex," Keats said with a voice filled with reassurance. "All I ask is that you think over the facts. I just want you to see in the end, like I want them all to see."
Alex listened, the encounter having tired her more than she had realised. She just wanted him to go, to leave her in peace.
"Did DCI Hunt come in here acting the hero?" Keats began again.
Alex reluctantly waited for more. There was always more with Keats.
"Did he come in here full of reassurance? Did he assure you that you would make a full recovery?"
"Of course he did," Alex agreed. "Gene is a decent man."
"No Alex." Jim shook his head with a look of sadness. "That's where you are sadly mistaken."
"What makes you say this?" Alex demanded.
"Look at your situation Alex!" Keats pleaded.
Alex looked away momentarily, reminded once again of her shame at being bedridden in this hospital.
"I don't need reminding sir."
"And that's why you should beware of Hunt! He brings you false hope of a recovery but Alex, you need to face facts, the real facts," Keats urged.
"And they are..?"
"The facts are Alex, you have a fractured T8 vertebra that damaged your spinal cord, and sadly, there is a high chance that you're not going to walk again. You'll need care, rehabilitation, therapy." Keats listed as if these were casual facts. "And the biggest fact of all is that it was Hunt who put you here. Again."
"No, no he didn't." Alex shook her head. "Gene gives me hope."
"Blessed are the destroyers of false hope, for they are the true messiahs."
"Bible quote?" Alex guessed.
"Of a kind," Keats agreed. "I'm just saying that Hunt is offering all this support in an effort to cover the tracks of his own involvement," the DCI continued. "He's already shot you once Alex! Now he's tried to have you killed, he's crippled you, yet you still trust this man?"
"Sir...Please stop...I'm tired," Alex pleaded. She was tired. She was also hurting and this was becoming too much.
"Alright," Keats reluctantly agreed to her request.
Alex nodded a small thanks. She just wanted him gone and her room back to her lone self.
"But be assured Alex, I am here for you." Keats stood, placing his hand briefly over Alex's.
"All I ask is that you think over what I've said," Keats urged as he turned to leave. "And that you at least beware of Hunt."
"Thank you for stopping by sir," Alex nodded, dismissing Keats's request as if it had never been said.

Keats left the room solemnly and stepped out into the hospital corridor. He stopped momentarily, closing the door behind him quietly. His mission here today was done and he was quite satisfied that he had achieved his objectives. He took a deep breath, puffing himself up confidently and then walked away down the corridor, his solemn and concerned expression giving way instead to a grin of satisfaction.
Yes, it had all worked well. He knew Drake had dismissed his suggestions, but he also fully understood how she worked.

Keats strode in the direction of the exit, all the time contemplating what would happen next. He knew Alex would think. It was what she always did. She would think and analyse to the point where it would be her undoing...and Hunt's.
He had planted the seeds of doubt well. He had demonstrated that he was on her side by bringing her the gift of the magazines. Just a small gesture, but enough to win her confidence. Only then had he carefully seeded her mind with doubt by accusing Gene.
She wouldn't believe it at first. He knew that for sure. Their bond was too strong to break straight away. But he also knew she would think about it, over and over, until the seeds of doubt began to bloom into something bigger.
The grin returned again. He had spent weeks in CID carefully 'grooming' Alex into doubting Gene, and this hit and run, as unforeseen as it had been, would make it even easier to turn her against him.
Passing through the exit of the hospital, Keats retrieved his Datsun keys from his pocket and headed to his car.
It had been a good day. Efficient and productive. He was pleased.

End Chapter 3

** If anyone is wondering where Keats alleged Bible quote is from - The quote "Blessed are the destroyers of false hope, for they are the true messiahs" is actually a quote from the Satanic Bible. It seemed to fit Keats perfectly!