Alex still felt that her skeleton was quaking even as she sat down behind her desk in CID the following morning. She had paperwork to complete, arrest warrants and case files to sign off on, but her fingers trembled around her pen and all the words on every page were just blurs of black lines, irregular and incomprehensible. Trying to take a steadying breath, although she felt that an earthquake had settled into her lungs and that the seismic shocks through her body were never-ending, she put down her pen and looked about the office.

The splinters cracked open by the past few weeks were all too evident in the atmosphere that morning, as they had been almost every morning since she awoke from the coma. Nothing was the way it was. The world seemed greyer, somehow, and broken. Shaz was typing up a report but there was nothing playing from the radio on her desk, no forgotten tab cans or chocolate wrappers. Chris was staring into space but there was no steady thud of a ball against the wall, no tap of his pencil against the desk edge, no whisper of paper screwed up and aimed at the bin in the corner. The ashtray on Ray's desk was overflowing as usual, but the man himself seemed hunched over and cold, spine crippled by and not proud of his DI status. As Alex cast her gaze about CID she felt distinctly that the backbone of the team she so loved was fracturing. How long before it broke? How long before Keats succeeded in his mission here?

She shuddered, feeling her heart thud its hollow arpeggio against her ribcage again at the thought of him, dark eyed and smirking, body pressed against hers as he named his terms. Swallowing, Alex dropped her head into her hands and tried so desperately to focus long enough just to breathe. In and out. In for seven seconds. Out for eleven. In for seven seconds. Out for eleven. Her head snapped up.

She could save them. She could save them all. Her gaze, as though by instinct, wandered to Gene's office. She could see him sitting there beyond the glass, whiskey tumbler already in his hand although it was only half ten, and there was nothing majestic or imposing about the Manc Lion now. This was not the Gene Hunt she knew. His spine, like Ray's, seemed to have crippled itself at the bottom, so tired of holding up the weight of proud shoulders and a consciousness that had seen too much pain. That had, perhaps, caused too much pain. He was slumped in the chair, eyes unseeing, lips set in the familiar pout, but there was no brooding pride in his eyes. There was only the emptiness of defeat, only the expression of a man who was staring into the void in the full knowledge that it was about to swallow him whole and that there was nothing he could do to escape it. This was not the Gene Hunt she knew. This was not the Gene Hunt that, despite the wrangling of her mind to overcome the faithful beats of her heart, she had come to love in her own incomprehensible way.

Unbidden, Keats' words return to her, snide and knowing: You would do anything to save Gene Hunt and his team, because they saved you.

Her hands were shaking. She was loath to admit it and the defeat tasted bitter on her tongue, but he was right. Gene Hunt had saved her. Ray, Chris, Shaz… They had all saved her. They had taught her to live again in this world, to smile and drink and work with them, to laugh at their jokes and join in their traditions and to feel, more than she had ever dared to feel, that she had a home among them here. They were a team, the five of them, although misfits all. Could she allow that to be broken? Could she allow their trust in the Guv to be torn apart, allow them to betray each other, to betray Gene? Could she allow Gene to fall so far, leave him stranded at the bottom with no way up and no way out, only crushed faith and devastation and the glimpses of what was and what could have been? Could she, having been offered a get-out clause, a bargain, a chance, pass it up and allow Keats to triumph over the strongest bond she had ever known, the best people and the most important connection?

Alex heard the door to Gene's office open and she looked up, inwardly sighing as Gene stood there watching her, spine straight but not straight enough for him to still be the man she knew.

"Bolly." He said it with a jerk of his head toward the office and she stood, breathing deeply.

Entering his office, she shut the door behind her quietly as though to shatter the team's silence would be to shatter the team itself. The very air seemed fragile.

"Yes?" she asked.

Gene only let out a long sigh and leant back against the window, watching her with tired eyes. "Keats is going to shut us down, Bols. I can feel it. He's going to file his report and throw us to the dogs and we're not going to be able to do anything to stop it."

Alex opened her mouth, and was surprised to feel tears building in her eyes, the saltwater stinging her irises as she willed them not to fall. He had no idea just how bad Keats' intended fate for them was.

"Guv," she said quietly, glancing down because she couldn't meet his gaze, not when he looked so defeated, so empty and so utterly without the fight she had always associated with him. "You don't know that, he might…He might have a change of heart."

Gene scoffed. "A change of heart, Bolly? An' he might sign up for the next production of My Fair Lady and bake us all cookies an' all!"

Sighing, Alex perched on his desk, fingers toying with the edges of unfinished reports. She still couldn't meet his gaze. "We've survived this far, Gene. We survived Scarman, Supermac…We might survive Keats and his cronies down at D&C yet."

"Nah," Gene sniffed, tipping back the dregs of his whiskey and looking down into the bottom of the glass. "We're a dying breed, Bolly, all of us. Even Shaz, even you. We do our jobs as our consciences dictate, and if that doesn't comply with the rule book then, well, we sod the rule book and we do the right thing anyway." He placed his glass down. "They're not looking for people who do the right thing anymore, Bols. They're looking for people who play by the rules. Early retirement or demotion or transfer…they'll scatter us and get rid of us any way they can."

"Gene…"

He shook his head. "Anyway, before all this does go to shit, Alex…" He caught her gaze finally by the use of her name. "Before it does… Have dinner with me. Somewhere actually posh this time, not Luigi's. Starter, main course, pudding. You an' me. Tonight."

"To…tonight?" A heavy weight dropped in Alex's lungs, in her stomach and in the cavity of her heart and she knew, and knew that she'd known from the minute the words had left Keats' lips, what her decision would be. She took a deep breath and felt her heart break.

"I'm sorry, Gene," she said softly. "I can't…not tonight. But maybe some other night, maybe…When all of this is done…It might just blow over, like I said…We might be fine."

Gene cleared his throat a little awkwardly, feet shuffling as he averted his gaze from her face. "S'alright, Bols, I can take a rejection."

"No, no – " Alex felt as though even the broken parts of her heart were breaking at the look on his face, stubborn and crestfallen and almost angry. "Gene, I…" she sighed. "Gene, I would love to have dinner with you. But…just not tonight. I'm sorry. I just…I have some things I need to do, to get sorted… I'm sorry."

"Yeah," Gene said, and she watched him close off from her again. The chasm in her chest felt raw as he moved to resume his seat behind the desk, sealing himself off away from her. "S'alright, Bolly. Just a thought. You can go now, paperwork to do an' all that."

Alex bit her lip, feeling that she should say something else, something more to fix this. But there was nothing to be said.

"Yes, Guv," she said quietly, slipping out of his office and feeling as though her whole world had caved in the moment she made the decision to save it.

Apologies for the slightly longer wait for this chapter, and that it's a bit of a filler! I didn't want to lump this in with what went before or what comes after though, so I hope it's okay. Thank you all so much for your reviews - each one makes me smile and so, so happy! Please continue to let me know your thoughts and, as ever, I am always open to constructive criticism!

Eleanor :)