Clementine Rosenberg stopped using the system on a Tuesday. There was no announcement. She simply didn't log in. The case dashboard remained untouched. No new notes entered. No updates submitted. The notifications stacked quietly in the background, unanswered.
Instead, she opened a legal pad and wrote the victim numbers by hand.
Twenty-seven names. Dates, places, all in order.
Ink didn't buffer. The paper didn't delay.
By midday, the absence was noticed.
Her phone rang just after one.
"Detective Rosenberg," came the chief's voice, smooth but tightened at the edges, "Why hasn't there been an update in forty-eight hours?"
She didn't bother sitting.
"Because the delays make proper work impossible," she said evenly.
A pause.
"That's not acceptable," he replied.
"No," Rosenberg agreed, "It isn't."
"You're required to document progress."
"I am documenting," she said, "Manually."
"That's not procedure."
"It's the only way forward," Rosenberg replied, "If you can get to someone, anyone who is in charged with the system to remove the delays, I'll return to the system immediately. If not, I'll continue this way."
Silence stretched.
"You're refusing oversight," the chief said.
"I'm refusing obstruction," Rosenberg corrected, "There's a difference, sir."
Another pause. Longer this time.
"You're putting yourself in a difficult position," he said.
"I've been there since the transfer," Rosenberg replied.
The line went dead without resolution.
She returned to her desk, shut the office door, and spread Hugo Bendi's materials across the surface.
Not the official files, the copies.
His handwriting slanted sharply to the right, notes compressed into margins, arrows connecting thoughts that never made it into reports. He had been mapping behavior, not evidence.
She flipped through page after page.
Response time narrowing. Escalation avoided. Authority proximity?
Rosenberg's jaw tightened.
Bendi hadn't been chasing the killer.
He'd been measuring the shadow around him.
She circled one line repeatedly, underlined:
Someone knows when we move.
Her phone vibrated again.
Another call.
She ignored it.
An hour later, the alert came through anyway.
New Incident Report.
No body found yet. Welfare check requested. Officer on scene.
Name listed under the address.
Hugo Bendi.
Rosenberg was on her feet before the page finished loading.
She grabbed her coat, keys, and badge, moving fast now.
She drove herself.
The house was already cordoned off when she arrived. Patrol cars lined the street. Neighbors stood back, watching.
An officer recognized her and lifted the tape without a word.
Inside, the air was wrong.
Still and heavy.
The living room showed no signs of struggle. Furniture undisturbed. A mug half-full on the table, coffee cold.
She moved down the hall.
The bedroom door was open.
Hugo Bendi lay on the floor near the foot of the bed.
His eyes were open.
Rosenberg felt something tear loose in her chest. Rage arrived first.
She stepped closer.
The mark was centered on his torso.
The same letter.
The same depth.
The same precision.
The G was clean, burned into him like an inventory stamp.
"Jesus," someone whispered behind her.
Rosenberg didn't answer.
She crouched slowly, forcing herself to see everything.
No forced entry.
No overturned furniture.
No chaos.
This hadn't been a kill.
It had been a decision.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath for a second.
"Who found him?" she asked.
"Neighbor," an officer replied, "He missed a meeting. Came to check."
Rosenberg nodded, "Time of death?"
"Estimated between midnight and two."
She straightened.
That meant the killer had acted after her confrontation.
After she stepped outside the system.
They weren't reacting.
They were responding.
She stood and looked around the room.
"Bag everything," she said. "His notes. His phone. His personal files. I want all body cameras on, and every piece of evidence sent directly to my office."
"Forensics will—"
"I'm taking custody," Rosenberg said sharply.
No one argued.
Back at her office, she locked the door and laid Bendi's materials out carefully.
Not the copies this time.
The originals.
His notebook was thick, spine broken, pages worn soft from use.
She flipped to the last entries.
Dates. Times. Fragments.
If I'm right, proximity matters.
They're not hiding, they're embedded.
Authority proximity is protection.
Rosenberg's hand tightened around the page.
Bendi had been close.
Close enough to die for it.
Her phone rang again.
She ignored it.
Then it rang a third time.
She answered without greeting.
"Detective Rosenberg," the chief said, voice-controlled, "Why wasn't I notified immediately?"
"Because I was busy," she replied.
"Busy with what?"
"With the body of the man who was trying to solve this case before I inherited it."
A pause.
"That's unfortunate," he said.
"That's murder," Rosenberg replied, "And it's escalation."
"We need to restore order," the chief said.
"No," Rosenberg said quietly, "We need to catch him."
"You're too close," he replied.
Rosenberg laughed humorlessly.
"He killed one of us," she said, "That makes this clear."
"Step back," he warned, "Let the process—"
"There is no process," Rosenberg cut in, "There's a killer who just told me exactly how close we are."
She ended the call.
She pinned Bendi's final notes to the board.
Authority proximity.
Administrative access.
Embedded movement.
She stared at the pattern until it burned.
This wasn't about fame.
It wasn't about chaos.
It was about control.
And now, it was personal.
Rosenberg picked up her pen and wrote a new heading on the pad. She stood alone with the evidence, the notes, and the certainty that Hugo Bendi had been killed for proximity, not defiance.
He had been close. He must be. Close enough to matter.
She gathered his papers carefully, methodically, and placed them in her desk drawer.
Whatever the system believed it was protecting, she no longer cared.
She would finish what he had started.