Mission Forensic
Part 32: Winter and Weight of Exams
December didn’t arrive in Delhi — it settled.
Soft and pale, like a shawl laid over the city.
The mornings were mist-edged; breath ghosted in the air. Students walked faster, clutched coffees longer, laughed quieter. The lawns gleamed under thin sunlight, and something unspoken moved through the corridors —
Exams were coming.
In the Forensic Biochemistry laboratory, the heater hummed like a low, tired animal. The class sat in loose quiet — notebooks open, pens tapping, attention careful.
Edward and Catherine shared the same desk, the kind of closeness that looked ordinary from the outside — except for the way their elbows rested near each other, the way their pages touched.
Behind them, Shawn sat wrapped in a scarf like a tragic poet in decline.
Ahana sat beside him, neat and composed, pen ready, already anticipating the lecture.
The door opened.
Dr. Tanisha entered — white coat crisp, hair pulled back, expression calm in the way that meant listen now.
She set a folder down.
“Students,” she said simply, “your End-Semester Practical Examinations will begin next week.”
The quiet in the room tensed — not panic, but alertness.
She continued, tone steady, unhurried:
“Five subjects. Five consecutive days. Fingerprints, Pharmacology, Forensic Medicine, Forensic Biochemistry, and Ballistics. The schedule will be uploaded shortly. Ensure your record files are complete and signed. Incomplete files will not be evaluated.”
No dramatics.
No lecture.
No threats.
Just fact.
Her gaze moved across the room not to intimidate — simply to see.
It paused, gently, on Shawn.
Not scolding.
Not calling him out.
Only reminding him — this time, effort matters.
Shawn exhaled.
Ahana nudged his notebook toward him.
“Write,” she murmured.
He wrote.
Catherine leaned slightly into Edward, voice low enough to belong only to him.
“So. It begins.”
He didn’t look away from the board.
“It was always coming,” he replied softly.
The bell didn’t ring.
The class just breathed out together.
December had started.
The Practical Exams
The campus changed without anyone saying so.
Laughing corners quieted.
The lawns emptied.
The library filled like a held breath.
White coats replaced casual jackets.
Pens replaced ease.
Silence replaced chatter.
Day 1 — Fingerprints
The lab smelled of ethanol and paper warmed under lights.
Reagent bottles gleamed like stored secrets.
Catherine dusted a latent print with a brush so soft it looked like thought made visible. The ridge pattern appeared clean, elegant, like a signature rising from silence.
Edward worked with Ninhydrin — violet blooming across paper in slow revelation, chemical and intimate.
No words.
Only presence.
At the opposite bench:
Shawn left powder everywhere except where needed.
Ahana exhaled — then took his sheet, shifted his hand, and guided the brush from above.
Their hands didn’t touch.
But the gesture landed.
And both of them felt it.
Day 2 — Pharmacology Viva
The room was warm.
The silence colder.
Questions fell like scalpel cuts.
Catherine answered first — clean, confident, steady.
Edward followed — structured, controlled, unshaken.
Shawn blinked twice, lost in metabolic pathways.
Catherine tapped her pen against her knee — two taps.
He remembered.
He lived.
Ahana pretended to be annoyed.
But her notebook had been angled so he could see her diagram if he needed it.
He didn’t.
But he saw her.
Day 3 — Forensic Medicine
The autopsy room held the particular stillness of things that no longer breathe.
Catherine answered case identification calmly.
Edward explained postmortem changes without hesitation.
Shawn stood too far from the specimen table.
Ahana stepped closer, not looking at him, just speaking quietly:
“It’s just anatomy. Not a threat.”
Shawn whispered,
“That’s exactly why it terrifies me.”
Her laughter — soft, unexpected — slipped out before she could stop it.
Shawn blinked, startled.
Neither spoke of it.
But something had shifted.
Day 4 — Forensic Biochemistry
Glass.
Color.
Steam.
Silence.
Catherine’s pipette moved with precise, liquid grace.
Edward looked up once, through the vapor of warm reagents —
her eyes met his.
That was all.
The world steadied.
Day 5 — Ballistics
Metal.
Magnification.
Patterns like tiny maps.
Edward examined cartridge striations with the focus of someone who understood how evidence spoke when humans failed to.
Catherine watched him with quiet pride — not dramatic, not romantic in flourish — but deep, the kind that grew from seeing a person do what they were meant for.
Shawn misidentified extractor markings.
Ahana corrected him without sighing.
That was the real miracle of the day.
When the last examiner dismissed them, the breath the class had been holding for a week finally released.
Everyone spilled into the winter sun — laughing not because something was funny, but because pressure had broken.
Shawn stretched his arms to the sky dramatically.
“I am once again a man of freedom.”
Ahana shook her head, but didn’t walk away.
Catherine tugged Edward toward the Ashoka trees near the library courtyard.
They sat.
Her head found his shoulder.
His fingers found hers.
No words, no rush.
Just warmth in winter.
A quiet victory shared.
A love that did not need to announce itself.
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