City of Genesis

• It's Okay to Cry •

The scolding lasted an hour.

By the end of it, Natalia had her head in her lap and her arms tucked beneath her legs. Sandra leaned against the commander's desk, hands over her ears as if that would block out the yelling and the swear words. Despite their reasonings, neither of her two former bosses believed they had done the right thing.

The former detective knew the fighting was wrong. When she was younger she was always starting fights with the people in the police academy and her seniors, but now she was better than that. She was above violence, but she would also be willing to do anything to ensure her case was resolved. They were so close to obtaining information about Yuri Arlov, but it was snatched away from them. Even if the results were still in the system, the commander refused to hand it over.

"I know you care about Nikita a lot and you as well Natalia, but this case was resolved a long time ago. Yuri Arlov was traded off to another region beyond our borders," commander Burke stated. "Whoever you saw in that house was not him-"

"Natalia confirmed that it was him!" Sandra exclaimed, surprising everyone in the room. Burke, however, didn't appreciate a former subordinate of hers raising her voice. "Just because you guys gave up on him doesn't mean I will," she added. The vice-commander knew it would happen before it actually did, and even Natalia was too slow to stop the commander from grabbing Sandra's collar and slamming her against the wall of her office.

James began to protest, but the commander wouldn't hear it.

"I need you to listen to my words carefully," she began slowly, "I think you can't let this go because you can't handle loss anymore..." Sandra did listen, and the more she did, the more upset she got. She felt her heart thudding so loudly she was surprised no one else could hear it. Tears began to prick the corner of her eyes as she tried to wrestle out of the commander's grip. "Losing Aiden was bad enough for us, but for you to lose him so young...Sandra, you need to learn that you can't fix everything, and that includes Yuri Arlov's disappearance."

As soon as she uttered those words, Natalia stood up as if to confront the commander, to tell her she was wrong and that Sandra wasn't blinded by past events. Her father, however, grabbed her shoulder and pulled her back.

"We need to go back home and have a talk, you and I," he said all of a sudden. She didn't like the sound of that, but Sandra wasn't looking at her or saying anything. Ask me to stay and I will, she thought, but the former detective didn't hear it.

The vice-commander and his daughter walked out of the office, leaving Sandra and Burke alone.

The commander released her collar, allowing the woman to slump against the wall. She hated that everyone used that as an argument against her. Whenever she had a gut feeling, people always questioned her judgement. Are you sure you're not angry because this sounds a lot like what happened to your fiancé- she wanted to punch those people in the face, prove them wrong.

Her situation was like no other. Who else had a mentally unstable sister who killed their sibling's partner because they believed he was some kind of murderer? How could that possibly affect Sandra's judgement in anyway?

"I'll make sure Louis doesn't press charges considering he harassed one of my best forensic analysts in the precinct, but I also don't want you coming here and using our resources again, do you understand?" Commander Burke demanded as she sat down back at her desk.

Sandra stood up straighter and pulled her ruffled shirt down. "Maybe you should take your own advice, commander, Aiden's been gone a lot longer than Frankie has." Was all she said before she left the office.

An entire week had passed since the incident at the precinct. Sandra told everyone that she would put the case on hold as she had other matters to attend to, but the reality was that she just didn't want to face anyone. Natalia stopped by her apartment three times before she finally learnt her lesson. I highly doubt anyone would tolerate getting a door slammed in their face, she grumbled in her head as she collapsed back in bed. Even though she hadn't done any work, she still felt incredibly exhausted.