Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Oh boy.

It’s a good one.

A neat little trail of blood spots like a macabre dot-to-dot treasure hunt, ending in a firework explosion of red, painting the perfect storyboard of how this late night encounter concluded. The who and why don’t matter to me, not really, but finding the neat order in the apparent disorder, is what I seek, what I enjoy. I twist my head side to side, gauging different impact angles as I crouch beside the blood spots one-by-one, noticing the way they have slight tails. Direction. Our victim was moving during the first few blows, alive and feeling every moment. Three bloodied shoe scuffs on the stained carpet, backwards heel prints in the direction of travel make the moment come alive in my imagination. The victim, confused and injured, stumbling backwards, facing their attacker.

There’s definitely something to be said about watching the realisation of imminent death cross the face of the soon-to-be dearly departed.

I should know.

‘Why are you fucking smiling at a crime scene, creep.’

I’m startled into standing and turning on the spot, to face the stone cold stare of Sergeant James Doakes. I would have jumped back in surprise, let out a gasping ‘oh I didn’t see you there’, maybe even pressed a dramatic hand to my chest to complete the look, to disguise my complete lack of ability to experience the emotion I should have in that moment. As it is, Doakes never falls for my little trying-to-be-normal acts, so I rarely put too much effort into it around him these days. I did, however, feel slightly perturbed by the turn of events. He had managed to sneak up on me un-noticed. And I’m not easy to sneak up on, far more used to being the one doing the sneaking, which goes to show just how enthralled I was in the moment.

‘I’m not.’ I say defensively, but it sounds petulant, even to my own ears. Like a kid caught denying eating the candy with chocolate smeared all over his face.

‘You look like the goddam cheshire cat got the cream.’

‘This is good solid evidence. Will really help with building the case.’ I say, sweeping my hand vaguely across the scene in front of us, hoping the promise of an easy win might lead Doakes’ thoughts away from those about me.

I should be so lucky.

‘You’re still smiling.’

Oops.

I school my face, force my cheeks to relax.

Aim for nonchalance.

‘I can see that freak robot brain of yours ticking away, playing at being human. You’re worse than Masuka, the sick little fuck.’ He spits.

‘That sick little fuck is stood riiiiight heeeere.’ Vince Masuka says in his sing song voice from the far corner, next to the smashed window, pausing in his ministrations to clean the camera lens with a single gloved finger.

‘At least he doesn’t pretend to be a normal human-‘

‘Don’t think I won’t go to HR for harassment… especially if it’s that little blonde cutie Delilah-’

‘Shut up you sex pest creep.’ Doakes barks without looking at him, eyes fixed solely on mine, apparently we have entered a staring contest. Hopefully not, don’t they say eyes are the windows into your soul? Doakes might spot there’s an empty cavern behind mine.

Masuka starts clicking away again, the flash of the camera reflecting off the white wash walls, illuminating the dark irises of Doakes’ eyes. Not much behind his either, I notice, stood this close to him.

‘Whereas you wear this… human suit, and play pretend.’

Doakes really ought to get a pay rise, he’s an excellent detective.

Spot on, in fact.

A few silent moments pass, broken only by more camera clicks.

‘The window was broken from the inside, so our vic probably knew her attacker as there wasn’t any sign of forced entry at the front door.’ Masuka says conversationally, as though Doakes and I aren’t stood almost toe to toe, staring deep into each eyes in the middle of an active crime scene like a pair of star crossed lovers donned in white coveralls and blue plastic shoe covers, surrounded by blood splats laid out like scattered rose petals.

‘Put it in the report.’ Doakes says, eyes narrowing slightly. ‘You’re a lizard, Morgan. And I’m gonna suss you out sooner or later, mark my words.’ He finally looks away and steps back minutely before fixing me with another harsh glare. ‘I hate lizards.’

The visual of Doakes stomping on lizards like a cartoon whack-a-mole is proffered by my own reptilian brain, and despite the somewhat serious topic of conversation, something in me bubbles up.

‘Don’t use that fake-ass laugh with me.’

I cut it off mid sound.

The funny thing is, I think, as Doakes shoulders past me out the room, that was actually my real laugh.

Chapter Text

Despite leaving the scene, peeling the plastic coveralls off, I can still feel the sense of wrongness clinging to me. Masuka's voice trails out from the room behind me.

‘What climbed into his arsehole and died?’

I can’t quite help the briefest of brief looks over my shoulder. Morgan still has his back to me, hasn’t even moved from the position I left him, in the middle of the surrounding chaos, just standing there.

And he doesn’t even do that like a normal person.

He looms. And lingers. Like a bad smell.

That hawaii-shirt wearing, floppy haired, wet-blanket lab-geek act is just that, an act. His doughnut routine might fool the rest of the clueless fuckwits I work with, but not me. I’d hoped Mari- sorry, Lieutenant LaGuerta- might have noticed it, but his sickly sweet fake charm seems to have worked on her too. Since she’s started climbing the chain-of-command corporate ladder, real detective work is taking a back seat for schmoozing and press conferences.

I exit the house, ducking under the police tape criss-crossing the front garden and path, nodding at one of the uniforms I vaguely recognise as I climb back into my car, revving the engine into submission, air conditioning blasting, and allow myself a deep in and exhale. I look back towards the house, at the broken window, where I can almost imagine him still stood there, grinning.

I don’t get why no one else has noticed.

For one, I’ve seen the guy in a tank top. No one gets, or needs, that kind of physique for ten-pin bowling and staring down a microscope all day long. It don’t add up. And if you’ve ever seen him at a crime scene, well, there’s gallows humour to lighten mood, and then there’s Dexter Morgan. His face lit up like all his fucking christmases have come at once.

Gives me the fucking creeps.

I caught him the other week, shuffling papers, trying to look busy by the photocopier, during one of Captain Matthews debriefs, head cocked to one side, listening in, minutely nodding along as the good Captain described the grisly details of our latest case, victim and their family hacked to shreds with a machete over a drug deal gone wrong. I saw him later, when he thought no one was watching, in the bullpen staring at the scene photos on the drawing board. His input wasn’t even needed on the case, perpetrator had confessed, no trial, no need for evidence, but there he was, casually engrossed in the pictures like he was looking at someone’s goddam holiday snaps. Course, the dam perp got released then promptly disappeared into the fucking ether due to bureaucratic bullshit, his lawyer managed to strike a deal if he rat on a higher up fish. But that’s beside the point. Why the creep was so interested was beyon-

Oh.

Oh.

Yes.

I got it.

He’s a fucking fan.

One of those serial killer worshippers who gets a hard on at the very idea of overpowering a helpless victim, but has to settle for living vicariously through one of any sick fucks we come across in our line of work.

You’know they ought to check his house for letters, I bet he fucking writes to the bastards on death row, asking them what it feels like to kill.

Urgh.

I need to go home and fucking shower, I feel dirty thinking about that psycho getting his rocks off over it all.

But… there’s definitely something more.

I felt it back at the scene, when he was staring at me, face expressionless, unblinking. Something I can’t quite put my finger on.

I try to shake the feeling as I twist in my seat, arm hooked over the passenger seat for a better view as I reverse, avoiding the groups of nosy neighbours and gormless onlookers starting to congregate. As I flick back round, car in drive, I catch my own pinched reflection in the rear view mirror.

It’s his eyes.

Emotion doesn’t reach them, like he’s dead inside.

Not quite right.

Inhuman.

He’s a creep motherfucker, that’s what he is, and I will figure him out, if it’s the last thing I do.