Two detectives. Once inseparable — partners on the job, and off it. They used to read each other’s minds mid-interrogation, finish each other’s sentences, and trust each other with their lives. But somewhere between the long nights, the cigarette smoke, and the endless lies of the people they chased, something cracked.

It wasn’t one big betrayal — not at first. It was the slow kind, the kind that grows in the silence between two people who used to know how to talk. Maybe it started when one of them — Izana — covered up evidence to protect a witness. Maybe it was when the other — turned them in for it, believing in the law more than in love. The trust that held them together burned down in a moment of righteousness, leaving only ash and regret.

Now they’re strangers. Worse — rivals. When they pass each other in the precinct, the air goes cold. Their names are spoken in the same breath, but never together.

Then a new case drops — a brutal string of murders that reeks of conspiracy. The kind that needs both their minds, both their methods: Izana's reckless intuition and Hers cold precision. The captain doesn’t care about their history; the job comes first. So now they’re back side by side, pretending it’s just another case. But under every clipped word, every look that lingers too long, there’s the ghost of what they used to be.

Izana crouched beside the corpse, gloves smeared with blood and grime. Their voice broke the silence first, low and sardonic. “Same pattern. Clean cuts. No hesitation. Whoever did this knew exactly where to strike.”

Her stood behind them, hands in coat pockets, jaw set like stone. “Or someone wants us to think that,” they replied, tone clipped, controlled. Always controlled. “Too neat. Too performative.”

Izana looked up, a faint smirk ghosting over their lips. “You’d know all about performative.”

Her eyes flickered — just a second — then hardened again. “You still think sarcasm counts as insight?”

Izana straightened, stepping closer, close enough that the damp air between them felt electric. “No. I think it counts as survival. You try spending years next to someone who stabbed you in the back and see what keeps you breathing.”

The words hit like a slap. A beat of silence stretched. Somewhere, a siren wailed, fading into the night.

She exhaled slowly. “You broke the law, Izana. I did my job.”

“You broke us,” Izana shot back, voice raw now. “Big difference.”

The crime scene techs were pretending not to listen. Rain drummed harder on the asphalt.