Author's Note: Guys. Rookie Blue. These two. Ugh. My heart. I've been playing around with this idea for the past few days as I power my way through the seasons, trying to catch up. So let me know what y'all think. We'll see where this one goes.

Disclaimer: I don't own Rookie Blue or any of these wonderful characters.

She answers her phone as she always does, despite the late – cracking an eye open she checks the alarm clock's bright red display blearily – early hour. "Holly Stewart." Gail asked her why she didn't answer Doctor Holly Stewart. She'd just smiled and shrugged and let her girlfriend puzzle it out over the rest of dinner.

"Holly."

It's Oliver. Why is it always Oliver? And she's rolling out from beneath the covers before he's had a chance to say anything other than her name.

"Holly, there-there's been a – uh – an accident. A situation."

He's always so apologetic on these calls, as though he's sorry for the inconvenience, for waking her up.

"Where?"

And he knows, knows what she's really asking. "Gail, she –"

"Oliver. Where is she?"

"Mount Sinai."

"I'm on my way."

"Holl-"

But she hangs up because that is not part of the dance. Him telling her why it is exactly that he's calling her 3:54 AM on a Wednesday night. Oliver explaining how quickly she should get dressed and out the door. Whether she should speed. Whether she should walk. Whether it'd be better for her to curl back up in bed and pretend his phone call was just some horrible, gut wrenching dream. No. That's not part of the dance. She calls it a dance, except it isn't, not really. It's more of a one-woman show – a routine – something practiced and perfected and reliable. Jeans. Yesterday's shirt. A sweatshirt, the oldest, baggiest one she owns. The one Gail steals whenever she's home alone at night, but refuses to admit she wears. The one the officer wraps herself up in, sleeps in, whenever Holly isn't there to hold her, until the scent of the pathologist has been completely erased, replaced with a faint hint of Gail's perfume. A sweatshirt. Her sweatshirt. But she has to pull it out from under Gail's pillow, and she has to pause, in the act of pulling it over her head, to smell the merest trace of perfume. After clothes, it's boots. Her phone in her pocket. Down the stairs to the front closet, where she slips into the first jacket her hands touch: Gail's winter coat. Car keys from the bowl on the table. A check to make sure she has her phone. And then gone, locking up behind herself, and out into the cold darkness that is Toronto in February. Seven minutes, flat.

It's a dance. She could do it in her sleep. Sometimes she does, in dreams when all she wants is to wake up, but it takes Gail's soft hand on her cheek, the other woman's sleepy murmurs to bring her back out of the trance. If only tonight were one of those dreams.

It's a dance. One in which Gail is an unwitting partner, an invisible, but altogether real partner. She dresses around Gail. She stumbles down the steps with one hand outstretched in front of her, reaching for someone who isn't there. She checks as she pulls the door closed, always expecting to see Gail there, stumping along behind, never the most graceful of dancers. And she starts her car with cold fingers, surprised when there is no one beside her to take her hand and blow on them, smiling slightly and looking away as though embarrassed at such a public display of affection in the privacy of their own car. A dance. Taking place in and around her thoughts of Gail. A dance – one she hates – one she never thought she'd need to learn. The one that haunts her.

She hates hospitals. Hates them. Strange, seeing as how she spent so much time in them at one point. But now she works in a morgue, in a lab, away from people who are sick. Because that's the thing about hospitals – they're full of sick people, sick people who are still alive. Still alive, but on their way to dying. And she's never liked this stage in the process of being human.

When they're already dead, their bodies already empty of whatever it was that made them truly human in the first place, then she can speak for them, understand them, care for them. But not here. Not in a hospital where everyone and everything exists in such a strange, twilight zone of maybe alive, maybe dead. All the hustle and bustle of a hospital. All the comings and goings. She hates it.

She's spent more time in this place throughout the past four years than she did during her entire time in medical school, than she did as a three sport athlete all through high school and then again through college. Doctor's visits, broken bones, med rotations. But this, these past fours, this has been the most time she's ever spent here. On this side of things. The side of four am dances alone in the darkness of her bedroom and the near-empty streets of the city. The side of idling. Of waiting. Of wondering. Of salt-stained blue chairs smelling of stale cigarettes, and coffee that more resembles sludge than dark roast. The side of the lover. The wisher. The hoper. The healthy. Four years, and she's spent more time here, surrounded by cops, than she did throughout the first twenty odd years of her life.

It looks, at first glance, as though the entire Toronto police force is crowded into the waiting room, milling around, more uncomfortable in the antiseptic whiteness than she is. She hadn't realized how much cops hated hospitals. How much they feared them. If they were there, it was either for a victim, a witness, or one of their own. No. Cops did not like hospitals. Especially not these cops. Not 15 Division, which had been having a run of bad luck lately – a six year run of bad luck. A never ending run of bad luck, Gail sometimes used to say while she and Holly were sprawled out safely on the couch together, a bottle of wine being passed between them.

"Oliver?" She finds him easily, sitting silently next to Chris, whose eyes are trained on the linoleum floor as though if he only stare hard enough, he'll be able to transport himself out of this place.

"Holly. Holly, hello." And he stands, reaching for her elbow, to lead her away from Chris, who still hasn't looked up, as Dov slides easily into the seat he's just vacated. She knows this step, too.

And this one, where Traci meets her eyes from across the room, Andy leaning against her, both of their eyes red-rimmed and puffy. They're officers. But they're people first.

"So," Oliver says, once they're free from the rustling, silent crowd. "So," and he doesn't look at her for more than a second at a time.

She wonders idly if he thinks it's strange that she isn't crying. But, surely he must know by now that crying comes later, crying is not a step for this place, not part of the dance. Not yet.

"So," third time's the charm. "There was a bomb."

And she's thankful he doesn't try to sugar coat it.

"A bomb." The word sounds foreign in her mouth, dirty metal.

"A bomb, yes. At a hotel."

She looks automatically at the TV set on the far wall. Live news coverage. The Archer Hotel. Downtown Toronto. If she squints, she can just make out the scroll at the bottom. Death toll unknown, but thought to be closer to 15 than 10. Three suspects. Two dead. One in custody. Continuous shots of the hotel, on fire, walls crumbling, windows shattering, people rushing to and fro in front of the news camera, cops, an older gentleman wearing silk pajamas that are torn and missing an entire sleeve. Satisfied this is real, not some horrible hallucination or dream state, she turns her attention back to the officer in front of her.

She likes Oliver. She really does. He's a good guy, sweet and funny, and he looks after Gail. She knows he does. He looks after all of them, even if they aren't technically his rookies anymore.

"Peck," he sighs, runs a hand through his thinning hair. Sometimes she forgets how much older Oliver is. Nights like tonight, that's when she is reminded. "Gail… She was inside when it went off. Fourth floor. With some other officers. We got them out. ETF was on the scene in nine minutes. And we got them out." Short sentences – easier to manage.

She nods, as though this is all routine, as though the things he is saying make sense to her, as though the ringing in her ears is nonexistent.

"We're not exactly sure what happened yet. Or why it happened. But we're working on it. We got one of the guys. Sammy's got him down at the station now. Everyone's working on it."

She wants to ask the question he's hovering around, bumbling his way towards. But they've been here before, and the steps lead her in a different direction first. "Everyone else?"

"What?" And he looks honestly surprised at her voice. "Yeah. They're all fine. Collins got a nasty burn, but he's being looked after. And the rest of them are fine. Just fine."

Repetition. Another way of making it easier.

"They'll be fine."

They. Fifteen Division's rookies. It's always them – as the 'they.' The 8 of them – including Traci – it's always them. She nods, turning back to the television, running her eyes aimlessly over the crowd. This next move is Oliver's, and he executes it flawlessly.

"Holly?"

She nods, but doesn't stop her scanning. She knows the one person she's looking for isn't going to suddenly appear, navy uniform blending in to everyone else's.

"Holly. Gail is – well, she's kind of in rough shape."

Another nod. Except she suddenly can't feel any part of her body except her chest. And the ache that is the pounding of her heart feels as though it's an ache of emptiness. An echo of a mere memory of what her heartbeat should feel like. The shadow of something can be as painful as its actuality, when you know it's all you're ever going to have again.

"And she won't let them treat her."

Wait. That's not how the dance goes.

"She won't let go," he sounds apologetic again. Apologetic and exasperated and worried.

"Let go?" The 'of what' goes unstated yet clearly understood.

He's holding onto her arm again, physically steering her towards the door marked "No Entrance. Hospital Personnel Only." Her feet move as bricks in mud. The whoosh of the automatic door sounds like the whoosh of the blood, once more pumping fiercely, in her ears.

Oliver hasn't answered her question. He hasn't –

When they come around the corner, the first thing her tired, over stimulated brain recognizes is that Gail's normally pristine blonde hair is matted with dirt and debris and what appears to be dried blood. The second thing she notices is that her girlfriend is sitting upright in a chair in the hallway of the hospital as doctors and nurses walk crisply past her still form. If she's sitting up, that must be a good sign. The third thing Holly notices is the way her stomach is suddenly in her throat and the oxygen levels are a bit lower than normal, making the air seem thin, and each breath a struggle. Oliver's grip on her elbow tightens and she is grateful for him, for his strength, and his unwavering devotion to this family of cops and loved ones that Fifteen has gathered around itself.

The fourth thing she notices is that Gail – well – Gail is crying. Her face, covered in a mix of dirt and blood, (who's blood?) is marred by clean tracks, rivulets of tears running down her cheeks, highlighting the extreme paleness of her already pale skin. Tears. Gail is crying. Silently. Not even seeming to notive that she's crying in public, where anyone might see.

Holly has seen Gail cry three times in the past four years since they've been together. Once when she slammed her finger in the car door. Those tears were accompanied by such an impressive array of curse words, Holly felt herself grinning, despite her girlfriend's obvious distress. The second was after dinner at Gail's parent's house, when Elaine spent the entire night asking why her daughter had yet to make detective. And insinuating, not so subtly, that the officer was letting her personal life get in the way of her career – an action on par with murder in the Peck household, and more disappointing than failure. That night Gail had cried tears of frustration in the car the whole way home, and Holly had pretended not to notice until she pulled into their driveway, parked, shut off the engine, and turned in her seat to lay the softest of kisses against the shining tear tracks on her lover's face. And the third time she'd seen Gail Peck cry had been the night she'd told the officer that she loved her for the first time. After which she found her girlfriend crying on the couch at three in the morning, wrapped in Holly's oldest sweatshirt, her hair unkempt, her eyes swollen, her nose running. That time, Holly had pulled her close and whispered it again. And again. And again. Until Gail's tears slowed and her breathing slowed. Holly didn't stop telling her in fact, until the other woman's body relaxed completely and she was certain Gail was asleep, there in her arms.

But all of those times had been private and shuttered, and over so quickly that sometimes Holly wondered if she'd only dreamed ever seeing tears fall from those blue eyes.

Gail is crying. Her shoulders still. Her breathing even. But the tears on her cheeks are clear and bright and call Holly to her more than any sound ever could. She looks at Oliver, confused and unsure and wondering why she was called with so much urgency if Gail is sitting up and clearly in at least some state of control, of consciousness.

"She won't let go," he repeats, as though it's obvious.

And when she turns back towards her girlfriend, already two steps closer to Gail, she sees it. And she stops dead. The fifth thing Holly notices about her girlfriend is not the large scrape above her eye, not the burn clear on her left arm, nor the way Gail's eyes are seeming to have trouble focusing on one spot on the stationary floor for longer than five seconds at a time. No.

The fifth thing she sees is that Gail's arms are wrapped tightly around something. Around a tiny body. A child. A girl. No more than three. Her legs locked around Gail's waist, her small arms coming up around the officer's neck, her tiny face buried in the woman's neck, just as silent, just as still. The fifth thing Holly notices is that her girlfriend is holding this tiny human, this child, as though her life depends upon it, as though holding on is the most important thing in the world, regardless of the blood oozing down her forehead, the concussion she has most likely sustained, the bruises covering her arms.

"She won't let go." And Holly stands, rooted in place, in a hallway full of doctors and nurses, with Oliver Shaw behind her. And her girlfriend - the woman she loves, the woman who has been dancing with her for the past forty minutes without know it – is holding onto a child as one might a life preserver, as one might the most precious thing in all the world, and she is not letting go.

AN: Thoughts? Should I continue?